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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



"THOU FOOL!' 



i i 



THOU FOOL!" 



AND ELEVEN OTHER SERMONS 
NEVER BEFORE PUBLISHED 



BY THE LATE 

D WIGHT L. MOODY 

America s Greatest Evangelist 



# 



THE CHRISTIAN HERALD 

Bible House, New York 






THIS ISA SERIES OF TWELVE REMARK- 
ABLE SERMONS BY D. L. MOODY, NEVER 
BEFORE PUBLISHED, AND THE EXIST- 
ENCE OF WHICH WAS DISCLOSED ONLY 
A FEW MONTHS AGO. THEY ARE FROM 
VERBATIM SHORTHAND REPORTS MADE 
BY REV. WM. BRIDGE, MR. MOODY'S 
STENOGRAPHER, AND THE ABSOLUTE 
AUTHENTICITY OF THE SERMONS IS 
VOUCHED FOR. THESE SERMONS ARE 
THE EXCLUSIVE PROPERTY OF THE 
CHRISTIAN HERALD. 






Copyright, 1911 
By The Christian Herald 

New York 



©CU295365 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

Page 
The Late Evangelist Moody and His Work for 

The Master 3 

Thou Fool! "Thou fool! This night thy soul shall be 

required of thee." Luke xii. 20 11 

Power for Service. "If any man thirst, let him come 

unto me, and drink.' ' John vii. 37 31 

How Backsliders May Return. "Go and proclaim 
these words, and say, Return, thou backsliding Israel." 
Jeremiah iii. 12 51 

How to Deal with Inquirers. "In the morning sow thy 
seed, and in the evening withhold not thine hand." 
Ecclesiastes xi. 6 71 

The Soul Winner. "And many of them that sleep 
in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlast- 
ing life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt; 
and they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of 
the firmament, and they that turn many to righteous- 
ness, as the stars forever and ever." Daniel xii. 2, 3. 92 

Working for Christ. "Which of the prophets have not 
your fathers persecuted? and they have slain them 
which showed before of the coming of the Just One, of 
whom ye have been now the betrayers and murderers." 
Acts vii. 52 106 

Trust. "Leave thy fatherless children, I will preserve 
them alive: and let thy widows trust in me." 
Jeremiah xlix. 11 127 

M' 



CONTENTS 

Page 
Instantaneous Salvation. "Who shall tell thee words, 
whereby thou and all thy house shall be saved." 
Acts xi. 14 143 

Excuses. "And they all with one consent began to 

make excuse." Luke xiv. 18 156 

Invitation and Altar Service. "Go out into the high- 
ways and hedges, and compel them to come in." 
Luke xiv. 23 168 

The Gospel. "I make known unto you the Gospel." 

1 Corinthians xv. 1 184 

God's Promises. Psalm xci. 14, 15, 16 200 



M 



A CONSECRATED LIFE 



A CONSECRATED LIFE 

THE LATE EVANGELIST MOODY AND HIS WORK 
FOR THE MASTER 

" O OME day you will be told that Moody is 
kJ dead. Don't believe a word of it. At 
that very moment I shall be more truly 
alive than I am now. I shall then be beginning to 
live. I was born of the flesh on February 5, 1837. 
I was born of the Spirit in 1856. That which was 
born of the flesh will die, of course; but that which 
is born of the Spirit will live forever/' 

These were the words of America's greatest 
Evangelist, spoken at a meeting in 1898. He 
passed away on December 22, 1899. 

The man who was to address the largest 
audiences ever gathered for religious teaching, 
who was destined to win souls in numbers so 
enormous, came out of a little New England 
village, with no advantages of education and no 
ecclesiastical or academic training for his work. 
Almost within sight of the home at Northfield, 
in which he died, was the humble cottage in 
which he first saw the light. His father died 
suddenly, leaving nine children for his widow 
to support on a mortgaged farm. Mr. Moody 

[3] 



A CONSECRATED LIFE 

often spoke in later years of the splendid cour- 
age his honored mother displayed in the emer- 
gency. It must have been a hard struggle, but 
her children stood by her loyally, "Dwight 
used to think himself a man when he was 
only a boy," his mother used to say in after 
years. 

When only six years old he went to a farmer 
and engaged himself as a hired help, his duty 
being to drive the cows to and from their pas- 
ture morning and evening. The sturdy inde- 
pendence of the lad was astonishing in one of 
his age. He worked on the farm, getting such 
educational help as the village school afforded 
until he was seventeen, when he felt that the 
time had come for him to enter a wider sphere. 
His mother had a brother in Boston engaged in 
the shoe business, and to him young Moody 
went to get employment. The wise man ac- 
cepted his nephew's offer, but made three 
conditions. The boy must live in a boarding- 
house of his uncle's selection; he must not 
wander about the city in the evening, nor go 
to places of amusement of which his uncle did 
not approve; and he must regularly attend the 
Mount Vernon church and Sunday School, The 
boy agreed to all and honorably kept his bargain. 
The third condition appears to have been a little 
irksome at first, but before two years had passed 

[4] 



A CONSECRATED LIFE 

Dwight L. Moody was an applicant for member- 
ship in the church, and was admitted. 

In the fall of 1856 Mr. Moody removed to 
Chicago, where he found employment as clerk 
in a shoe store. He united with the Plymouth 
Congregational Church and volunteered for 
Sunday School work. He does not appear 
to have met with much encouragement. He 
surprised the trustees by hiring four pews, 
which was an unusual thing for a bachelor to do. 
But it was his habit to look up any young men 
whom he could get acquainted with, and he 
would invite them to occupy his pews. They 
were filled at every service. He also found a 
little mission church in North Wells street which 
seemed to be in need of help, and he offered his 
services as a teacher in the Sunday School. He 
was told that there were already teachers for all 
the classes, but if he would bring new pupils 
he could form another class. The next Sunday 
he marched in at the head of eighteen bare- 
footed children, whom he had collected out of 
the slums. Each one, he reminded the super- 
intendent, had a soul to be saved, unpromising 
as the material looked. The class grew so 
rapidly and received additions of so many older 
members, that Mr. Moody rented an empty 
saloon for its accommodation. 

In a short time he had a Sunday School of his 

[5] 



A CONSECRATED LIFE 

own, with seven hundred children and sixty 
teachers. Larger quarters becoming necessary, 
Mr. Moody obtained the use of a large room 
over the old North Market, which was used on 
Saturday nights for dancing. After the dances 
were over, Mr. Moody took possession of the 
room and with his own hands swept and cleaned 
it and prepared it for the meeting of the Sunday 
School. He also opened it for a week evening 
service, to which, in some way known only to 
himself, he brought a motley audience. Like his 
Master he sought out the neglected and the lost, 
and found his hearers among the heathen of the 
city. So fascinated did he become in this work, 
that he took the bold step of giving up his busi- 
ness to devote all his time to it. "But how are 
you going to live?" asked a practical friend, to 
whom he announced the step he had taken. "I 
don't know/ 5 Mr. Moody replied, "but I can 
stand it for several weeks, and if at the end of that 
time God wishes me to keep on, he will provide 
the means. He can, you know." Mr. Moody's 
faith was justified by results. In a short time 
the work outgrew its quarters, and Mr. John V. 
Farwell came to its relief by erecting Farwell 
Hall, which had accommodations for the Y. M. 
C . A. as well as for Mr. Moody's mission. 

The outbreak of the Civil War turned Mr. 
Moody's attention temporarily in another di- 

[6] 



A CONSECRATED LIFE 

rection. He visited the camps and made ad- 
dresses to the soldiers. There he first realized 
his power as a speaker and acquired that manly, 
argumentative style of talk which characterized 
all his subsequent addresses. After the war 
he resumed his evangelizing of the slums of 
Chicago. Farwell Hall was burned, but Mr. 
Moody refused to regard the destruction as 
an intimation that his work there was ended. 
While the ruins were still smoking, he was 
around among the business men of the city 
with a subscription paper, and as soon as it 
was possible to occupy the ground, he had 
the funds in hand for the erection of a new 
building, and the plans for it in the builders' 
hands. 

The mission grew with such rapidity that in 
1863 it was necessary to erect a church building. 
Mr. Moody married, and a career of increas- 
ing usefulness and prosperity as a city pastor 
appeared to be opening before him. The great 
fire, however, changed that prospect. Mr. 
Moody was called to serve in the great cities, 
and to minister to the church universal. The 
great meetings in the Hippodrome, New York, 
convinced him, if he had needed conviction, 
of the character of his future work. 

It is unnecessary to tell here the story of his 
campaigns, in which, accompanied by Mr. Ira D. 

[7] 



A CONSECRATED LIFE 

Sankey, he went to every city, from the Atlantic 
to the Pacific, and from Canada to the Gulf. 
On the other side the Atlantic the triumphs 
were as great. No buildings were large enough 
to hold the people who thronged to hear a plain 
man, in strong, forcible Anglo-Saxon words, ex- 
plain the way of salvation. Wherever he spoke, 
either in his own land or across the Atlantic, 
the common people heard him gladly; and men 
like Drummond and Gladstone, highly educated 
as they were, sat at his feet delighted. 

Exhausting as such labors were, Mr. Moody's 
energies were not satisfied. The enterprises at 
Northfield testify to his boundless activity. 
The Seminary for Girls, established in 1879, 
was the beginning of an educational work which 
has developed with phenomenal rapidity. The 
Chicago Institute, the School for Boys at Mount 
Hermon, and the numerous buildings at North- 
field — which make up a town of themselves — 
are all memorials of the devotion and conse- 
cration with which he applied himself to the 
Master's service. Nor did these alone exhaust 
his energy. In later years his summer schools 
— in which many a minister gained new inspi- 
ration for his work — won for him the gratitude 
of the churches. Besides these, his pen was 
always busy, and his Colportage Library pene- 
trated with its Gospel literature to every corner 

[8] 



A CONSECRATED LIFE 

of the English-speaking world. To the last 
moment of his life he was devising new methods 
of service, and was looking forward to labors 
still more abundant. 

In the course of a noble eulogy at the funeral 
service, Bishop Mallalieu paid this glowing tri- 
bute to the great Evangelist : — 

"The heart of no disciple of the Master ever 
beat with more genuine, sympathetic, and utterly 
unselfish loyalty than did this great heart. 
Because he held fast to the absolute truth of 
the Bible, and unequivocally and intensely 
believed it to be the inerrant Word of God; 
because he preached the Gospel rather than 
talked about the Gospel; because he used his 
mother tongue, the terse, clear, ringing, straight- 
forward Saxon; because he had the profoundest 
sense of brotherhood with all poor, unfortu- 
nate, and even outcast people; because he was 
unaffectedly tender and patient with the weak 
and sinful; because he hated evil as thoroughly 
as he loved goodness; because he knew right 
how to lead penitent souls to the Saviour; 
because he had the rare and happy art of arous- 
ing Christian people to the performance of their 
duties; because he had in his own soul a con- 
scious, joyous experience of personal salvation, 
the people flocked to. his services, they heard 
him gladly, they were led to Christ, and he came 

' [9] 



A CONSECRATED LIFE 

to be prized and honored by all denominations, 
so that Protestantism recognizes the fact that 
he was God's servant, an ambassador of Christ, 
and, indeed, a chosen vessel to bear the name of 
Jesus to the nations." 



[10] 



"THOU FOOL!"* 

" Thou fool! This night thy soul shall be required of thee" 
Luke xii. 20. 

LET us all hear what the Saviour has to say. 
It is recorded in the 12th Chapter of 
Luke, 16th verse: "And he spake a para- 
ble unto them, saying, The ground of a certain 
rich man brought forth plentifully; and he 
thought within himself, saying, What shall I 
do, because I have no room where to bestow 
my fruits? And he said, This will I do: I w T ill 
pull down my barns and build greater; and 
there will I bestow all my fruits and my goods. 
And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much 
goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, 
eat, drink, and be merry. But God said unto 
him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be 
required of thee: then whose shall those things 
be which thou hast provided? So is he that 
layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich 
toward God." 

Some people think it harsh that the Saviour 
should call a man a "fool." When a man is 
called a fool in the Bible, it means that he lacks 

* Preached at Tremont Temple, Boston, Mass., Feb. 25, 1897. 

[ii] 



"THOU FOOL!" 

spiritual discernment, or that he is living with- 
out God, or that he is a man that makes a 
mock at sin, or a man that says: "There is no 
God." 

Now, we find that this man, in the sight of 
others, was what we would call "a very suc- 
cessful man." You might call him "a noble 
man." I haven't any doubt that he stood well 
in the community where he lived. We locate 
him in the valley of the Jordan. He, perhaps, 
had one of the best farms there was in the 
valley. He lived in the most wonderful day of 
the world's history. There never were before 
him just such days, and never have been since. 
I can imagine that John the Baptist preached 
in sight of his house. From his front door he 
could see the great crowd flocking, day after 
day, out into the desert place to hear this 
wonderful preacher. Or, John came from the 
wilderness of Judea day after day into that 
valley, and it may have been that this man's 
farm was so near that he could hear that voice 
as it rang out from John's lips up and down the 
valley, "Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven 
is at hand !" It may have been that the Saviour, 
after John was beheaded, preached there also, 
within a quarter of a mile of that man's farm. 
When he sent out the Seventy, two by two, 
they may have come into that man's neighbor- 

[12] 



"THOU FOOL!" 

hood to preach; and I haven't any doubt but 
that he said, like a great many business men 
today: "I can't go to hear that preacher; 
business must be attended to- I must look after 
my farm. I'm piling up wealth for this life." 
I don't know of any more honorable occupation 
than that of the farmer. This man's business 
was all right; you can't find any fault with it. 
Now, there are some things that we're not 
told. We aren't told he was a dishonest man, 
or in trouble, or that he went into stocks and 
speculated, and made his money in that way, 
or that he cheated the widow, or that he failed 
and paid "fifty cents on the dollar," or that he 
rented his property for brothels or wine shops. 
I'll venture to say that if you had lived near by, 
you'd have found all his neighbors speaking 
very highly of him, and calling him "a very 
shrewd, long-headed, successful business man." 
He had good stock from Egypt, and some from 
Syria. No one found fault with his stock. He 
had the best cattle in the valley — and no man 
had better horses or mules. He had the very 
best sheep in that region. The farm was "kept 
up"; fences all right; beautiful shade trees; 
beautiful lawn in front of the house — every- 
thing very trim and orderly. Perhaps some 
one — some of you — may say: "That man is 
good enough; let him alone." I venture to 

[13] 



"THOU FOOL! 5 ' 

state that if he had been a Bostonian, they 
would have made him an Elder or a Deacon. 
As became a successful man, a prosperous man, 
he had a good record! He didn't get drunk. 
His character stood very, very high. His word 
was as good as his bond. All the men he em- 
ployed spoke well of him. They never thought 
of a strike, for they liked him. 

You can't really find anything against this 
man's character, can you? And yet the Sa- 
viour calls that man a FOOL. What's the 
trouble? It strikes me that the trouble's right 
here: That man worked, and owned, and 
planned. From the cradle to the grave, just this 
little, short, brief time marked all life held for 
him! He knew nothing, or cared nothing, about 
another life. He might have gone to church; 
might have gone to Jerusalem to all the relig- 
ious feasts; he might have paid his tithe; he 
might have been an orthodox Jew. He ob- 
served all the outward forms, because that 
would give him respectability, and standing, and 
position. And yet, with all that, the Saviour 
says, he was a FOOL. 

There's a" passage somewhere in the Bible 
that says, "What is highly esteemed of man is 
an abomination to God." God looks at things 
differently from man. It seems to me better 
that a man should never have been born than 

[14] 



"THOU FOOL!" 

to live and die for this world, and take no 
thought of the life that's to come. 

I picture this man in his drawing-room one 
night. He had a master-builder come in with 
some plans. He's going to take down his old 
barns and build larger. Well, there's no harm 
in that! A great deal better to build up new 
barns than to drink up the old ones. If he had 
been a drunkard, he would have drunk up all 
the buildings. Oh, how he lights up! He talks 
about the best farm in the valley. I have seen 
such farmers as they planned for two years 
ahead. They wanted to have better barns 
than any in town. This man is going to have 
the best barn in the whole valley of the Jordan. 
His wife says, "I'll to bed; the children have 
all gone." But he sits up till midnight, laying 
plans, and he says to his soul: "Soul, take 
thine ease. " The old clock strikes out the day's 
last hour; and the builder says: "I must go; 
my wife is awaiting me." He bids Squire 
Simeon "Good night," and is off. But Simeon 
has got so excited over the barn that he can't 
sleep. He's going to sit up longer. It is one 
o'clock — the doors are all closed, the blinds 
fastened, everything quiet and silent. No 
sound of a foot-fall, but a stranger makes his 
appearance, and Simeon looks up, and says, 
"O Death! You haven't come to call me 

[15] 



"THOU FOOL!" 

away thus suddenly, have you?" "Yes, this 
night thy soul must be required of thee." "O 
Death! Don't take me so suddenly; let me 
have a little time to get ready, to set my house 
in order, to prepare to meet my God!" "Oh, 
but you've had all the years, all the time; 
your time is up. You must go tonight!" "O 
Death! Stay thine hand — give me a year!" 
"No; you can't bribe me," says Death. "But 
you never warned me." "Yes: your father is 
gone, and he died younger than you. Your 
mother is gone; your first-born — didn't I give 
you warning when I took him? And last week 
you attended the funeral of your neighbor, 
your next-door neighbor; you've been in nearly 
all the houses about here attending funerals for 
the past twenty-five years. I ought not to be a 
stranger to you. You knew I was coming, but 
you didn't take me into your calculations." 
"Oh, let me call my family, and let me bid them 
adieu." "No! Now I must take you!" And 
Death lays his hand on the farmer; and, lo! 
his heart ceases to beat, and in a little while his 
body turns cold. His head is bowed on his 
breast, as he sits in his chair. His wife, nor any 
of the family, hears a sound. Death has come 
in so quietly that not one of the family heard 
his step. 

The morning breaks, and the servants begin 

[16] 



"THOU FOOL!" 

to move around. The servant whose business 
it was to keep the house in order comes into 
the drawing-room, and opens the door; she 
sees her master is asleep, and says: "I'll not 
wake him." But soon the wife awakes. 
"Where is my husband? Perhaps he has had 
some trouble with his heart." The wife is 
alarmed. She dresses in haste and calls the 
servants. "Have you seen the Master?" 
"No!" She didn't call the right servant. She 
calls another. While she's dressing, the servant 
that had gone to the drawing-room comes in, 
and says: ; 'Yes, the Master is asleep. He 
fell asleep in his chair last night." The wife is 
wild with trouble;, she's afraid it may be some- 
thing other than sleep, and hastens to the room, 
and puts her hand on his forehead — it is cold 
as marble! He's been gone for hours! The 
alarm soon passes through the house. The 
children come in weeping. Soon the neighbors 
hear of it. In that hot country they couldn't 
long keep his body. That day he is buried! 
They lay him away in his grave. There's a 
funeral; perhaps an oration delivered. He's 
held up as a sort of beacon to guide young men 
in the ways of the man whose life had been so 
successful. It may be that they built a great 
monument to his memory. It may be there 
was a great lawsuit and that the lawyers got 

[17] 



"THOU FOOL!" 

all he had "laid up." That's often the way of 
it now-a-days. And the Angel comes down 
and writes upon that monument: "FOOL!" 

My friends, if you went into the cemeteries, 
and looked upon the tombstones, and could see 
what God has written on them, how many 
times you'd see the word, " FOOL. " " FOOL. " 
May God wake us up today, that we may be 
wiser than that man was; that we may plan a 
little further than just from the cradle to the 
grave! It's too short a journey. It's soon 
over. And I pity, down deep in my heart, any 
man or woman that's just living for this little, 
brief time, and making a wreck of it all. Now, 
I want to call your attention to the mistake that 
this man made. Let us say that he neglected 
his soul's salvation. Do you know that the 
greatest calamities of life come upon us by 
neglect? A man cries out: "What have I 
done?" Supposing you have done nothing but 
neglect your soul's salvation? 

A few weeks before the Chicago fire I went to 
see a doctor about a little child that I was told 
was going to lose its sight. The mother came 
in with the beautiful baby, and said: "Doctor, 
my child hasn't had its eyes open for days. 
Will you see what's the trouble with it?" And 
the doctor put a little salve upon the eyelids, 
and presently he answered: "Your child is 

[18] 



"THOU FOOL!" 

blind! It has not seen for three days; it will 
never see again." When that truth flashed 
upon the mother, there came up a wail from her 
heart that made the doctor and myself weep. 
We could not help it. She pressed the child to 
her bosom. "Oh, my darling! You can never 
again see the mother that gave you birth!" 
And the doctor told me that if the mother had 
brought the child to him a few days before, it 
could have been saved. The mother had ne- 
glected the child until its sight was lost. There's 
not a mother here today whose heart doesn't 
go out towards that other mother. Each says: 
"Oh, how I pity her!" But it is ten thousand 
times worse to neglect the soul of your child — 
the soul, the soul! And that's what this pros- 
perous man did. He took good care of his 
body, clothed it, laid up good store for it, and 
said, "Soul, soul, take thine ease!" But he 
neglected his eternal interests and made ship- 
wreck of his life. And there are scores and 
scores of such wrecked lives. You know we 
lost some battles in the Civil War because 
sentinels neglected to give warning. That was 
all! A man may be tried and shot in the army 
if he neglects his post — neglects his duty. It 
seems to me, there's no greater neglect than this 
neglect of our eternal welfare. Neglect your 
health, and you'll soon come to decay. Ne- 

[19] 



-THOU FOOL!" 

gleet your business, and you are soon ruined. 
Can you afford to neglect your soul — your 
SOUL? And, you see, that's the sin of thou- 
sands in Boston today. Isn't that the sin of 
hundreds in this hall today? They are neglect- 
ing their soul's salvation! 

They tell a story of an Indian on the Niagara 
River. The paddle lay at the bottom of his 
canoe. He was asleep, perhaps dreaming of 
beautiful hunting grounds, or of his wigwam, 
when, all at once, he heard the waters thunder- 
ing over Niagara; but this was in his dream. 
They had tried to wake him from the shore, but 
failed. Soon the mighty cataract awoke him. 
He sprang up and in an instant took in the situ- 
ation — the awful danger. He seized a paddle 
and plied it with desperate energy against the 
current. It was too late. There w T as a time 
when he could have paddled against the current 
and .so saved himself; but he slept till the on- 
rushing waters had pulled him to the edge of 
the cataract; then a second's pause on the edge, 
and with a fearful cry the Indian went over 
into the depths of death! Isn't that a picture 
of many sleeping, slumbering, while the current 
bears them on and on? Many in this audience 
are spending their last days on earth. This is 
the year 1897, and there are a good many in 
this audience to whom it may be said ere many 

[20] 



-THOU FOOL!" 

days, "Thy soul is required of thee now!" 
Some of us are spending our last month, some 
the last year, and some the last five years upon 
earth. I was thinking, as I was considering the 
subject today, of my own town. I went back 
there to live twenty years ago, and my mind 
ran up along one street, and I found Death had 
been in every house in the tw T enty years. And 
there was no other street where Death had not 
entered. My own house was entered, and so 
were my neighbors' houses, up and down that 
street. How many homes have been entered by 
Death in the last five, ten, fifteen, twenty years? 
Hardly a house represented by this congregation 
that Death has not been visiting in twenty years. 
Where will this audience be twenty years hence? 
Now, hadn't we better get ready? What's going 
to make a dying bed easy? 

Two business men were discussing this question. 
One of them was an infidel; the other turned to 
him and said, "How is it with you; what is 
going to make your dying bed easy; is Infidel- 
ity?" "No," said the other, "that won't." 

I had a talk with a man last night, an older 
man than I, and I asked him if he was a Chris- 
tian. He* replied: "I'm an infidel." I said, 
" What does your infidelity give you? " " Noth- 
ing." "What have you in the future to look 
for?" "Nothing." "Living for nothing?" 

[21] 



"THOU FOOL!" 

Then I went from this hall, thanking God that 
I am not an infidel. I thank God that I've 
got something better than infidelity. I don't 
believe that infidelity is going to make that dy- 
ing hour sweet. Do you? Another man said: 
"Culture! Culture will do it!" And that was 
discussed, and I asked: "What is culture going 
to do in the dying hour? Culture may be all 
right in its place; but when you come down to 
the swellings of Jordan, what is culture going 
to do? What are art and education going to do? 
What else is going to help in the dying hour?" 
(A voice from the audience: "A good hope in 
the Lord Jesus Christ!") There's nothing else. 
And if you only stop to think, everybody will 
say, " That's so." Infidelity takes everything 
from me. My friend, I want to tell you that 
you may be a successful business man, but if 
that's all, you haven't much to cling to. You 
must leave it all. To be at the head of the 
commercial world in Boston or in any other 
place won't help. 

I remember the head merchants of Boston 
when I came here as a boy, and how I used 
to look up to them. I worshipped Success in 
those days. One of them, I venture to say if 
I mentioned his name, there'd be a hundred 
in this hall who'd remember him. He won in 
life; did he win for eternity? But they are all 

[22] 



-THOU FOOL!" 

gone — forty years and all have gone. Forty 
years hence there'll come another audience, 
and if a man has lived all his life for this world 
alone, his name will have been forgotten, forty 
years hence. Isn't that so? 

Oh, how I w r ish we could get our eyes open 
today to see something besides worldly success, 
honor, and fame. I pity the man who has his 
whole thought centered on this life. Would to 
God that we could get a spiritual uplift. I 
don't know who is the author of these w T ords, 
but I want to read them to you: "The soul 
said to the body, 'We must surely part, and 
now let us reckon together.' 'Let us reckon, 
sister,' said the body. 'You,' said the soul, 
'have been active in labor and toil, early and 
late, and gathered much gold. Will you keep it 
with you or shall I take it with me? Who is going 
to take it? Take it down to your grave, and 
some thief w^ill dig it out before the snow falls.' 

'Alas!' said the body, 'how can I take it 
among the darkness and dust and corruption of 
death? What will it profit me there?' 'No,' 
said the soul, 'but how can I carry it w^here 
earth and earthly things are not suffered to 
enter? And, after all, it is but yellow earth.' 
'And, shortly, it will be neither mine nor thine/ 
said the body, sorrowfully. 

'Our reckoning is not over,' said the soul. 
[23] 



"THOU FOOL!" 

'How are we to meet again, if we must meet 
again? Will it be in sorrow or in joy? You 
have never allowed me to look heavenward, but 
robbed me of my freedom and used all my 
powers to help you to get gold?' 

" 'Alas!' said the body, 'you tempted me, 
and now you reproach me/ 'What, and if we 
should meet, as fellow-tormentors, bound to- 
gether for eternal misery?' said the soul. 'I 
am defiled as you are, and you have never 
cared for our cleansing. I am without a right 
to Heaven, as you are, and you have never 
cared for entrance into it. So, then, this gold 
will be our mocking accuser in eternity, and I 
shall reproach you forever for having destroyed 
me in getting it.' " 

Now, let us turn these thoughts in upon 
ourselves. What are you living for? What is 
your aim? Is it to get gain? To buy and to 
sell? To die a millionaire? I was sometime 
ago with a man of some means, who married a 
Christian woman. They had had a child that 
died. He had been a hard laboring man. He 
passed away. When he died, the widow looked 
up all the money, and said, "My ambition is 
now to have my only boy become a millionaire 
when he is twenty-one." That's a pretty low 
aim, isn't it? And that was a professed Chris- 
tian woman! Wants her boy to be a million- 

[24] 



-THOU FOOL!" 

aire at twenty-one! That's the Rich Man 
who, in the Saviour's day, was called, FOOL. 
"This day thy soul shall be required of thee." 
Now, turning from this subject, I want to 
ask this congregation to do something that I 
think is perfectly right. There's a place in 
the Psalms where it says, "I'll pay my vows 
in the presence of all the congregation." We 
should have a grand time here this afternoon 
if every man and woman in this house would 
"pay his or her vows." I venture to say that 
there's not a person in this place that's not 
living under some broken vow. There's some 
hour in your life when you made a vow that 
you haven't kept. I can't tell you when; but 
now, while I am speaking, your own conscience 
tells you — your mind flies back to that hour 
— when you made a promise. It might have 
been at the midnight hour, when there came a 
rap at your door, and you were awakened out 
of a sound sleep and were told that your mother 
was dying. You hastened to her; she was con- 
scious, and she talked with you, and taking 
her hand, you promised to meet her in heaven. 
You shed a few tears at the grave. You told 
the minister who officiated that you would be 
a Christian. Am I now talking to a great 
many in this house who have made some similar 
vow? When your wife was taken from you, 

[25] 



"THOU FOOL!" 

didn't you say, "I can't call her back, but I'll 
serve her God"? When your child was taken 
away from you, didn't you make some vow of 
that kind? 

Do you know, Life seems now to me like 
going up a hill and then coming down; you go 
up the hill slow and down the hill fast. Days 
pass now like hours. A week glides away like 
a day. Months seem like weeks. It seems to 
me but a little while since I came to Boston. 
I would like to take this whole audience with 
me now and have you just imagine that you are 
going up this hill; some of you are on the top 
of it, in the meridian of life, and stand on the 
summit of the hill. Just pause with me, and 
look to the cradle from whence you started. 
Remember when you started out; it is only a 
little while ago; and as you are looking down the 
hill you see a tombstone. It marks the resting 
place of some member of your family. You 
stood once by that open grave and took vows. 
And you promised yourself and friends that you 
would lead a different life from that day on. 
Why not pay your vows in the presence of this 
congregation? Why not say now: "I will! God 
helping me, I will keep that vow; I will make it 
good today." 

But you mark another grave. It is not 
mother's nor father's, but a narrow, short grave. 

[26] 



"THOU FOOL!" 

A little child came into your life and was the 
sun of your home, and like the ivy twining 
around the oak, it twined itself about your 
heart; and then death came and took the child. 
Didn't you make promises? 

I remember the first time I was called out of 
Chicago to speak. I was invited to go to 
Indiana. A gentleman met me at the station. 
He took me to his house. It was a very hot 
day in summer. The blinds were closed to 
keep out the flies and the heat. He said his 
wife was busy in preparing to entertain some 
friends; and he would like to be excused. He 
left me in that dark room. I could not read, 
and I got very restless. I thought if he had any 
children, I would go out under the trees, and 
so I asked, "Have you any children? " He said, 
''Yes, I have one"; and then he hesitated, and 
continued, "she is not here; my only child is 
in heaven. I am glad she is there." 'You 
are glad your only child is gone?" I exclaimed. 
'Yes," he said; "but there was a time when I 
could not say so." "Was there anything wrong 
with your child? Was she healthy and well 
while living?" "Yes." And he took up an 
old-fashioned daguerreotype, and the girl looked 
as beautiful as any child I had ever seen. Hand- 
ing me the picture he said, "That's a correct 
likeness of my child." "How old was she 

[27] 



"THOU FOOL!" 

when she was taken away? Could you tell 
me?" He answered, "Mr. Moody, when that 
child was living I worshipped her; she was the 
idol of my heart. I never went to church. I 
could not have had any serious thought about 
the future state. Every night I could get away 
from my business, I took to go riding with her, 
or walking with her. My life centered in that 
child; she was the idol of my heart. 

"One day I came home and she was sick; I 
paid no attention to it. Oh, sir, in a few days 
she was gone. She melted away like a snow- 
flake. And I accused God of being unjust. I 
would have torn God from his throne. For 
three days and nights I was awake. I refused 
to eat, drink or sleep. I buried her. And 
when I came home, my home and heart were 
as dark as the grave. I had lost my child. 
You know how desolate the house is when some 
members of it have gone out?" 

While walking up and down his room, he told 
me, he had heard a voice, and thought it was his 
child calling to him. "But no, that voice has 
been hushed in death," he said, "and I could 
never hear it." Then he thought he heard 
footsteps coming; and he whispered, "No, I 
shall never hear the sound of her footsteps 
again." Up to that time, he told me, he hadn't 
wept. 

[28] 



-THOU FOOL!" 

His agony had been so great he couldn't 
weep. Then he gave way. And, he said: "I 
suppose it was a dream, but it always seemed to 
me like a vision that God had given me; a 
vision of heaven. I lay on my bed asleep, and 
I dreamed I was crossing a field, waste, barren 
and cheerless. I came to a river. It looked so 
dark, so cold and so cheerless that I drew back 
from the bank. Just across the river I saw the 
most beautiful land my eyes had ever rested on. 
I stood there, gazing on that land, and I said, 
'Oh, how beautiful and fair!' I thought sick- 
ness and death never entered that land. I 
would like to be in a land where Death cannot 
come, where there would be no separation and 
where parting was unknown. While I lay there, 
gazing upon that dream land, I saw beings, all 
looking so young and so happy. As I gazed at 
them, what was my joy and delight to see 
amongst the number my own darling child, 
and she came running down and waved her 
little hand, and said, 'Father! Come right this 
way. It is beautiful here!' Then I went down 
to the banks, and I thought I would plunge into 
that river. I tried to find a bridge, but there 
was none in sight. I walked up and down the 
banks, but could find no boatman. At length 
a voice came to me over the water, 'Father, 
come right this way; it is beautiful here!' 

[29] 



"THOU FOOL!" 

While I was walking up and down the banks, I 
heard another Voice saying: 'I am the Way, 
the Truth and the Life; no man cometh unto 
the Father but by me/ The Voice awoke me 
from my sleep. I rose that night and made my 
first prayer, and I cried to God to forgive and 
save me. And God saved me that night. I 
no longer look upon my child as lost, but as 
living in glory, and every day I can see her 
beckoning me and calling me heavenward. 
My life has been very successful. I have been 
Superintendent of the Sabbath School for eight 
years. Hundreds have been converted in that 
Sabbath School, and we have got you down 
here and hope there'll be some fruit." 

Am I speaking to mothers, here today, whose 
children have gone? If those children could 
call back from that world of light, it would be: 
"Mother! Come this way!" Am I not speak- 
ing to fathers, here today, whose children have 
crossed the river? I don't believe there's a 
man or woman in Tremont Temple but has 
some one — it may be a sainted mother — 
gone. Isn't she beckoning you away from this 
world of sin, woe, wretchedness and misery? 
We have got an Elder Brother. Nineteen hun- 
dred years ago, the Son of God crossed the 
river. May God help you to come to him 
today ! 

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"7/ any man thirsty let him come unto me, and drink' 9 
John vii. 37. 

WE have been talking about the work of 
the Holy Spirit. I will go rapidly 
over the points we have made up to 
the present time: His work is to convict of sin, 
to shed abroad the love of God in our hearts, 
to impart hope, to give liberty, to testify of 
Christ, to guide us into all truth, to show things 
to come, to bring remembrance of things that 
Christ taught us, to comfort us. This morning 
we were speaking about the three dwellings: 
the tabernacle reared in the wilderness by Moses; 
the temple built by Solomon, and these bodies 
that have been cleansed by the blood of the Son 
of God as the temples for the Holy Ghost to 
dwell in. I was trying to show, when we closed 
this morning, that the Spirit of God dwelling 
in us, in you, the daughter of God, is one thing, 
and the Spirit of God upon us for service is 
another thing. Men have tried to straighten 
me out on these points; but if there is one thing 

* Delivered at Tremont Temple, Boston, Mass., January 
14, 1897. 

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that I've got evidence for, it is this: that one 
may be a son or a daughter of God, and still 
not have power. I think I know hundreds and 
thousands who cannot say they are not Chris- 
tians; but they are Christians without power. 

You may say they are disobedient, because 
they might have it; but the fact is they haven't 
got power. Samson had it, and lost it. I 
meet a great many people who have had power 
and lost it. Now, mark you, power is one 
thing and influence is another thing. Lots of 
men have influence, but not Holy Ghost power. 
Ahab had influence; Elijah had power. A good 
deal of difference. Saul had influence, but 
David had power. I'd rather have power 
than influence. David had power and went 
out and slew Goliath. Strength is one thing 
and power is another. The giant of Gath had 
strength, but David had power. God is a super- 
natural God, and you've got to have supernat- 
ural power to do His work. 

Now I believe that the weakness of multi- 
tudes of Christians lies in the fact that they are 
trying to do their work with money, with 
influence, with intellectual and social power. 
These things are all right in their place; but 
they are not going to redeem this world. You'll 
find such things spoken of in this Book. There 
was Nicodemus who came to Jesus by night to 

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seek light, and he got it. But he barely got it. 
He heard the grandest sermon ever preached in 
this world. Nicodemus heard for the first time, 
probably, that "God so loved the world that He 
gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever be- 
lieveth in Him might not perish, but have ever- 
lasting life." I suppose all agree that this is 
the sublimest sermon in the whole Bible. And 
Nicodemus was the first man to hear it. Nico- 
demus was exalted to Heaven on that sermon. 

But he reasoned: "I belong to the highest 
court in the world; but if I unite myself with 
that despised Nazarene, I shall lose caste." 
Oh, if he had been like Moses, and got out of 
the Sanhedrin! It was a great sacrifice for 
Moses to leave the gilded palaces of Egypt and 
turn his back on the throne. If Nicodemus had 
identified himself with the apostles of Christ, 
he might, later on, have become one of the 
apostles. But there he stood in the Sanhedrin. 
And there are a lot of Christians, holding on to 
their influence and dignity, who have influence, 
but not power. And there's where we are 
today. 

The men who wielded an influence in Sodom 
would have said Lot was one of the most influ- 
ential men in the city; perhaps had the best 
turn-out, owned some of the finest corner lots 
there. If you had talked of taking your family 

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down there, they would have said and he would 
have said : " We can give your cattle much better 
attention than that Abraham." Many thought 
that he was "long-headed," a "very long- 
headed man." There's a man, the best busi- 
ness man in all Boston, and perhaps all his 
children are going to ruin. But "he's very long- 
headed." The Lord pity him. I had a friend 
once — in fact, his sister is in this audience 
today — who said he could never understand 
why his wife was always so eager about paintings. 
There was no beauty in them to him. A few 
years ago his eyesight failed him. He was 
asked: "How have you got on all these years? 
You've got a long eye and a short eye, and 
never saw anything straight." He changed his 
glasses. After that this man became more in- 
terested in paintings than his wife, and he even 
built an art-gallery. Why? Because he could 
now see the beautiful. Many Christians in Bos- 
ton have a long eye and a short eye. (Laugh- 
ter.) You can never see clearly in that way. 
Abraham was a long-sighted and Lot a short- 
sighted man. Lot saw the well-watered plains 
of Sodom; that was all. Now when God goes 
at things, you will find your money will go like 
a bonfire. If there had been a railroad run- 
ning up from Sodom to Jerusalem, Lot would 
have been its president, and he would have 

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been "The Hon. Mr. Lot, from Sodom." An 
honorable name, but his family going to ruin 
all the time. That's the trouble. But when 
God came to investigate, He found a different 
state of things. 

I have no doubt that when Abraham plead 
off on Sodom, Lot said: "It's all right now." 
But we are told, in the New Testament, that his 
righteous soul was vexed. He was the man of 
God in Sodom; but I can find a thousand Lots 
in Sodom today where you can find one Abra- 
ham; fathers piling up their millions, and their 
children going to ruin. May God open their 
eyes ! 

Don't become satisfied with being a Chris- 
tian merely — barely a Christian. Now go over 
into another chapter, and you will find a higher 
type — that woman of Samaria going to get a 
pot of water and she found a well full. " Come 
and see a man that told me all things that ever 
I did. Is not this the Christ?" If she had 
been in Boston, they would have said, "Rebecca, 
keep still. You don't know how long you'll 
hold out. If you'll keep still, we'll take you 
into the Church." But she drank deep of the 
Water of Life. She got a better draught than 
Nicodemus. O man, drink deep! Don't be 
satisfied with barely getting water. If I have 
a tumbler of water, I can say, "I've got water," 

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just as if I owned a whole reservoir. You can 
see a lot of people having Christ; but you've 
got to probe to find life. Jesus came that we 
might have life, and that we might have it more 
abundantly. And what we want is not to be 
satisfied with getting water, or even with the 
well; we want something better than that. A 
man said he had a well with two features about 
it — it froze up in the winter and dried up 
in the summer. There are lots of just such 
Christians. They are not the right kind. Peo- 
ple talk about spasmodic effort; I am as much 
opposed to it as any other man. I have been 
studying it for thirty years. I don't believe in 
spasmodic efforts; and when a man drinks as 
God wants him to drink, he can't help working 
summer and winter. 

You know I am one of those old-fashioned 
people that believe this fact: I believe that 
any man or woman, filled with the Spirit, rivers 
of spirit will flow from them. There'll be a 
tree full of sap, with fruit; there'll be blossoms 
and fruit. And if it is a shade tree, there'll be 
leaves. And when a man is filled with the Spirit 
of God, he will be filled with fruit. 

Now, you haven't to go back four hundred 
years to Martin Luther, or to Wesley or to 
Whitefield. Go back a few years to London, 
and there was a man that died — but I am 

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thanking God he never died; he lives now. 
This man had never been in Harvard or Yale. 
The Lord said: "Now, Charles, you go up to 
London and I will let rivers flow from you." 
And he went up to London, and he stayed there 
forty years, and tens of thousands listened; 
and no man ever gathered such a great number 
under one roof as that boy preacher. They 
called him a Boy Preacher; they tried to laugh 
him down and ridiculed him. He had a great 
Book. He would shut himself up to read it. 
And when he came out he didn't know much of 
anything, he was not learned. But, look and 
see! Where is his influence today; what power 
has he had for forty years? Every Thursday a 
sermon came out, I don't know in how many 
languages, but it went into all the corners of 
the earth. He preached to vast crowds, and 
when he died there was an Orphan Asylum with 
two hundred and fifty boys in it, and another 
for girls, and one of the finest Theological Semi- 
naries, and there were colporteurs going all 
through the world's waste districts, where they 
do not have the Gospel preached; and there 
were almshouses. He wrote, but I don't know 
how many books have come from his pen; I 
don't know how many Baptist chapels have 
sprung up, all from that man's influence. A 
man in London told me that there were eighty 

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Baptist chapels built through the influence of 
C. H. Spurgeon. It is literally true — a man 
filled with the Spirit of God, there'll be rivers 
flowing forth from him. That's what we want. 
Yes, we want men and women Spirit-filled. 
I don't know of anything that will crowd the 
world out but the Spirit. 

A person said to me, "You made a great 
mistake today. You told the people they 
ought to be filled with the Spirit. You didn't 
tell them to be emptied. They can be emptied 
just as easily as they can be filled." Yes, and 
no easier. Not a bit. I have known a lot of 
people who have tried to pump themselves 
empty, and they don't make any progress. A 
child on a rocking horse — beautiful motion 
— but making no progress. 

Try and get selfishness out of your heart, and 
see how you will succeed. Try to get those 
mean, low things that mar your testimony 
out of your life — and you can't do it. You 
haven't the power. If there wasn't air in this 
building, you couldn't hear my voice. You ve 
got to have air to hear a sound. Go to San 
Francisco at eleven o'clock in the morning, and 
you'll find people out in their summer clothes; 
and about ten o'clock p.m. ladies go out in 
sealskin jackets. Why? Aw^ay out on the 
alkaline plains the sun strikes the sand, and 

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there's a vacuum, and the cold air rushes 
through the Golden Gate and settles in the 
streets of San Francisco, and it is colder weather 
in July and August than in any other two 
months of the year, because the air is rushing 
in there to fill the vacuum. I fill that tumbler 
with water, and I want to get the air in. I go 
to work. I am going to put this book in there. 
You laugh at it. Trying to get pride and jeal- 
ousy and envy out. I will pump the water 
upon him that is thirsty and floods upon the 
dry ground. There's air there, is there? Put 
some dust and chaff in there, and it sinks. Let 
it stay and settle. When the human heart is 
full of the love of God, you can't put air and 
dirt into it. The trouble is that the Christian 
has just about that much full, and when the 
devil comes and puts dust in there, it sticks. 
"I will pour water upon him that is thirsty 
and floods upon the dry ground." Is it so in 
Boston? Let us pray for floods ! Not for drops, 
but to have God lift the flood-gate and let the 
tide come in. 

Hear this: "Blessed are they that hunger and 
thirst after righteousness, for they shall be 
filled." They shall be filled. And, I'll tell 
you, God will fill every cup here today; every 
one of you can be filled, if you will. I want to 
say another thing: The more you get, the 

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more you will want. And when you get filled, 
you will pray God to give greater capacity, so 
that you may have more. The trouble is that 
a lot of people are satisfied with a little. I 
believe God will fill every cup, but I believe 
there are some awful small cups. It wouldn't 
take a long while to fill some cups here, they are 
so small. There's a little cup, a dainty one, 
and it won't hold much. If you are very thirsty, 
it will not satisfy you; it's too small. "My 
cup runneth over," said one; and you are satis- 
fied with a cup that won't run over. Be a man 
and be thirsty! There are hundreds of small 
cups in Boston. I would say to you: "Get the 
biggest cup you can find in Boston." You can 
have a good big cup, if you will. Pray God to 
increase your capacity. Don't be satisfied with 
small things. I honor God when I ask for great 
and mighty things. Ask for great things here 
today. 

Mark now! Heaven's measure is good meas- 
ure, shaken down and running over. How can 
you keep free from the world? How can you 
keep from progressive euchre? Keep filled. 
You know, I've got something better. The 
Lord does not say, " Come now and give up this, 
and that, and the other "; but "Get filled with 
my Spirit." Ministers say: "How can I keep 
my Church out of the world?" My reply is: 

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"Get them filled with the Spirit, and they are 
out at once." 

Now, when Christ was about to leave his dis- 
ciples, he told them to dwell in Jerusalem until 
they were endued. "Ye shall receive power, 
after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you." 
Do you suppose that Peter, James and John 
had troubles about the power? But I can 
imagine Peter saying: "Lord, wait! Men are 
dying! Shall we not go back and work? I 
wouldn't have left my fishing smack for three 
years but for the hope of power. Do you re- 
member the first Sabbath Day you met us in 
Jerusalem, and breathed on us, and said: 
'Receive ye the Holy Ghost'? Then I felt the 
power sweeping over my soul." Yes, Peter, 
you had the power. If the disciples had not 
had power, they would have had creeds, creeds 
only. "When the Holy Ghost comes upon 
you, ye shall receive power, and ye shall be 
witnesses unto me, . . . and unto the uttermost 
parts of the earth." 

They were in Jerusalem. You talk about 
the disciples in Boston. They are like the dust 
in the balance compared with those in Jerusa- 
lem. They had to preach right to the very men 
whose hands were dripping with the blood of 
the Son of God. 

See the results when the disciples got the 

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power ! See how He came on the Day of Pente- 
cost. It is not carnal to pray that He may 
come again, and that the place may be shaken. 
I have thought, too, that Pentecost was not a 
miracle that is not to be repeated. I believe 
Pentecost was but a specimen day. I think the 
Church has made this woful mistake that 
Pentecost was a miracle never to be repeated. 
I believe if we looked on Pentecost as a specimen 
day, and began to pray, we should have the old 
Pentecostal fire back in Boston. That's what 
we want! May God open our eyes and reveal 
it to us ! Let me show T you that I am on Scrip- 
tural ground. In the Second Chapter of Acts, 
He came, and they were all filled full and run- 
ning over. My cup runs over like that cup 
there (pointing). Go into the Fourth Chapter, 
and you'll find Peter and John have been 
brought before the Sanhedrin. That body said : 
"Preach all you want to, but not in that man's 
name." We think the wily old devil attended 
to that. A man might come into this city and 
preach like Demosthenes, and if there wasn't 
anybody affected and not a convert, every 
paper would come out, and every paper 
would say: "There's nothing in it." They 
would be delighted, you know. But let them 
preach in the name of Jesus Christ, and let 
drunkards and sinners be afraid, and there'd 

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be a difference. If Gabriel should save a soul, 
he would lose his character right off. It is 
astonishing how bad a man becomes when God 
sees him. Now they said: "Preach all you 
please, but don't preach in that man's name." 
Many ministers can preach science, and astron- 
omy, and geology, and metaphysics, and theol- 
ogy, and higher criticism, and lower criticism, 
and broad Churchism and narrow Churchism, 
and all these isms, and all get along very well 
without Christ; but these unlettered fishermen 
knew only that Christ lived and died, and 
rose again, ascended on high, and is coming 
back. That's the knowledge Boston needs to- 
day. This cultured Boston needs it, and wants 
men to preach it till they have results. 

The disciples had another prayer, and the 
place was shaken again. Think of it! These 
men were filled again. They must have lost 
some power; for only the men filled in the 
Second Chapter of the Acts were filled again in 
the Fourth. If Peter and John, filled in the 
Second Chapter of the Acts, were filled again in 
the Fourth, don't you think the Boston preach- 
ers need to be filled? Yes! If I take that 
empty pitcher, and with it an empty tumbler, 
and walk down the aisle, I would never find 
anybody thirsty. But let me have it filled, 
I'd find out who is thirsty. The trouble is, 

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you young Christian workers are carrying 
around a lot of empty pitchers. But when you 
see a man with a good pitcher of water, or a 
good bucket full, and he has more than you've 
got, you'll want it. Of course you will. Get 
filled yourself! Get a good bucket of water, 
and start out! These men got more and more, 
and got filled again. 

Listen! Years have passed away. There's 
a meeting in heaven, up around the throne. 
Words were sent down to tell Cornelius whereby 
he and his house were to be saved. And in the 
11th Chapter of the Acts, Peter is giving an 
account of that meeting. He unlocked the 
door; and lo, as he was speaking these words, 
the Holy Ghost fell on them, as at the beginning. 

Now if that coming of the Holy Ghost was in 
Jerusalem and in Cesarea, why not in Boston? 
And why should we not all be filled? Let the 
light of heaven flash into our souls. "Blessed 
are they that hunger and thirst after right- 
eousness." O men and women, make up your 
minds you are going to be filled. It will settle 
all the Church quarrels; you can't have a Church 
row where the Spirit of the Lord is. It would 
sweep them all out of the way. One breath on 
Jerusalem, and away went the troubles. Isn't 
that so? I'll tell you, it's the only thing that's 
going to fill us with satisfaction. If God doesn't 

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come and save in His infinite mercy, we are 
gone. I don't believe these things can go on. 
I believe we are going the way of Babylon and 
Rome, the way the old cities went, unless God 
revives His work. Every Church should be 
praying, "O Lord, revive Thy work! Revive 
me!" Why not every man go out of here as a 
torch to light Boston? Is there any reason? 

Some English people went to Africa, to colo- 
nize and settle. They got into a certain place, 
and it was very beautiful. The country was 
delightful. They said to some of the natives: 
"Do you have rain all the year round?" "Oh, 
no!" they said. "There are a few months when 
the rain doesn't fall." They went to another 
place, and thought they would settle there. 
First they asked the natives: "How is it: do 
you have plenty of rain here?" "No; there 
are certain months when we don't have rain 
here." At the third place, they asked the na- 
tives how it was there. "Oh, yes," was the 
answer; "the clouds are with us all the year 
round." They got under the pierced clouds. 
O men and women, get under the pierced 
clouds. Plenty of rain. Let us get under the 
cloud! Why not? Why not now? Is the soil 
barren? Are the trees fruitless? Have you 
toiled all night and caught nothing? Let us 
today get the net on the right side of the ship. 

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POWER FOR SERVICE 

We shall have a big haul. You will have it in 
your churches. Somerville will have it. We 
shall have it in Faneuil Hall. We shall have it 
all around. Let us get full of the Spirit. I 
am so tired and sick of the men who talk, talk, 
talk; and they get up in the prayer meeting 
and kill everything in the meeting. God doesn't 
speak through them. There's no unction. Let 
God re-commission every minister in this town 
to preach the Gospel, and re-baptize every 
worker. That's the prayer we want to make 
today. Wouldn't you like to receive an anoint- 
ing for your burial — you old man, about to 
pass away? Some old men dry up and wither 
up, and people are in a way glad when they are 
gone. Others are like the clouds at sunset, and 
leave light behind them, because they are full 
of the dew of heaven, and the joy of the Spirit 
of the Lord rests upon them. O man, get 
anointed for your burial. Don't you want a 
baptism for your last days? Make up your 
mind to seek it. Don't be satisfied with your 
present attainments, but reach out for some- 
thing higher. 

When Elijah was taken up, he was down at 
Gilgal with Elisha. And Elijah said to Elisha, 
"Let us go to Bethel and see them who are 
there." We have a lot of students from Newton 
here today, and from Boston University. Eli- 

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jah thought he would like to see the students 
at Bethel. When he got to Bethel, he said, 
"Elisha, Elisha, do you know that your master 
is to be taken away today?" "Hold your 
peace; I know all about it." Presently he said: 
"Elisha, you stay here, and I will go to Jericho 
and see how the students are getting on there." 
Elisha said: "As the Lord liveth, you shall not 
go without me!" They started for Jericho, and 
when they got there, the entire student body 
came out, and one said, "Elisha, Elisha, do you 
know that your master is taken aw r ay ? " " Sh — ! 
Hold your peace. I know all about it. Don't 
say anything." Elijah said, "Elisha, you stay 
here, and I wiM go over Jordan and worship." 
Elisha said, "As the Lord liveth, you'll not go 
without me!" Man, be in dead earnest and 
you'll get the power today. Hold right on! 
Do you remember when the woman came and 
said her child was dead? The man of God said: 
"Go and put my staff upon the child." The 
servant went, but failed. But Elisha did not 
fail. Keep near the Master, for He never 
failed yet. Do you tell me that Elijah was not 
pleased that Elisha held on? 

Talk about power! Talk about Alexander 
making the world tremble with his army, and 
Napoleon with his army! Why, all that man 
Elijah had to do was to speak, and old Jordan 

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knew, and fled before him. And when he 
wanted fire, he prayed, and fire came down. 
When he wanted rain, he prayed, and the rain 
came. The waters piled up, and fifty of the 
prophets came out of the city to see what was 
going on. I can see these students all eager 
to watch, and the prophets passing through 
the bed of the river and into the desert. All 
at once Elijah said to Elisha, "What do you 
want? I tried to leave you at Bethel, and you 
wouldn't stay; and then again at Jericho, and 
you wouldn't stay. Now, tell me what you 
want, and you shall have anything you ask for." 
I'd like to have some millionaire tell me that. 
I'd tell what I want for my Schools at North- 
field, and then I wouldn't get all. It would be 
a bold request. 

No man had the power that Elijah had; and 
Elisha never stopped, but said, "I'll blurt it 
out. I'd like a double portion of your spirit." 
I see the fifty prophets crowding in, and hear 
Elijah saying, "You've asked a hard thing; but 
if you see me when I leave you, you shall have 
it." Do you suppose Elisha took his eyes off 
him? The two marched on arm in arm. I'd 
like to have heard that conversation. There 
came a whirlwind, and it took up one, and they 
became separated. But Elisha, who was dead 
in earnest — what did he care for that whirl- 

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wind? He cried, "Where is my Master? Where 
is my Master, Elijah?" He didn't want to 
have him go away without leaving the power. 
He said, "I'll get the power if I only see him." 
Here in the choir, here in the organ loft, you 
are bound to get the power, the flame of fire in 
the heart, if you see the vision. He cried out, 
"My Father, my Father; the chariots of Israel 
and the horsemen thereof." He never said any- 
thing about the blessing. He just reminded the 
Lord of his promise, and that is all. O Lord, 
you promised that. Elijah remembered his 
promise, and he took his old mantle and threw 
it back, and it came down into the dust. Don't 
talk about your dignity; that you are the pastor 
of the richest church in the United States, and 
have got such an influential position. O man! 
Get down in the dust. Get power! Get down! 
Oh that we could just get into the dust today, 
and get power. He rent the mantle. You've 
got nothing. God will give you everything. 

I am afraid if Elisha had been a Bostonian, 
he would have said, "I don't feel I've got it. 
Really, I look just as I did before Elijah was 
taken. You know, I thought I would feel a 
shaking, a sensation, like Samson, and that I 
could do everything." That's the way he would 
have talked. But Elijah simply said: "If you 
see me when I am taken away, you shall have 

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the double portion/' Elisha went up on that 
promise, then started back on his life's work. 
The fifty prophets saw him come out of the 
wilderness, and they said, "Look, look, look, 
Elisha is coming around. Elijah is gone, and 
we shall never see his likes again." Man, don't 
believe it! Don't think for a moment that the 
Lord can't get on without you. When a man 
gets that idea, he is good for nothing. God 
can get along very well without any of us. 

The fifty prophets saw the prophet come to 
the brink of the river. Up to that time he had 
power enough to walk, and that was all he 
needed. But he got to the river. His Master 
was gone. I can imagine him standing on the 
bank of the river, and lifting up his voice, "O 
God; the God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and 
of Jacob ; Thy prophet, Thy servant, told me if 
I saw him when translated that I should have a 
double portion of Thy Spirit. Let me have the 
power of God." And he took up the mantle 
of Elijah, and old Jordan knew and wasted 
away. The water dried up; and he went 
down to Jericho, and the fifty prophets cried: 
"Elisha — the power of Elijah is upon Elisha!" 
And it was so — a double portion. Read the 
lives of both, and you'll find Elisha performed 
more miracles than Elijah. Go for the big cup 
full! 

[50] 



HOW BACKSLIDERS MAY RETURN* 

"Go and proclaim these words, and say: Return, thou backsliding 
Israel." Jeremiah iii. 12. 

I WANT to make an explanation. Some 
people have said that I made the state- 
ment that "nine-tenths of the Church mem- 
bers haven't got power." I did not say that to 
hurt any one's feelings; but I call up a good 
many Christians who lack power to seek people. 
Christ says: "Go and disciple the world!" 
Am I uncharitable when I say that there's not 
more than one out of ten who is doing that kind 
of work? I don't want to slander the Church. 
I would never preach again as long as I live if I 
thought I was hurting the Church. I would 
shed tears of blood if I thought I was hurting 
the Church; and I pray God day and night to 
help me to awake the Church. I don't say they 
are not Christians, by a good deal. I never 
dreamed such a thing. Many are good, con- 
verted people, but they haven't got "convert- 
ing power." There's the trouble. I hope you 
won't misunderstand me. 

* Delivered in Tremont Temple, Boston, Mass., January 
20, 1897. (p.m.) 

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BACKSLIDERS 

Now, I want to come back to the subject of 
this morning. I didn't get through with what 
I want to say about backsliders. I wanted to 
tell you how you backsliders may get back. I 
was very much cheered by so many coming to 
me after I got through. One man followed me, 
and wanted to get back to the Lord. That's 
what I want to tell — How you can get back. 

There's one peculiarity about the pit into 
which the backslider gets, and that is that while 
there are many ways in, there's only one way 
out. That's the way he got in. The same 
road that led you away from Christ will take 
you back. How did you get away? You all 
know; every one who is a backslider knows. 
You know how you went away. You left Him 
without a cause. I will challenge a backslider 
to give a reason for leaving the Lord. You 
can't do it. Take that home, and stick it into 
your mind! What took you away from the 
Lord? You think you've got a good excuse; 
but, have you? Have you an excuse that will 
stand the light of eternity? Some woman says 
her husband hasn't treated her right. Ought 
not that to have driven you nearer to Christ? 
Was it the Lord who gave you a bad husband? 
Some man may say, "My wife hasn't treated 
me right." Should that have changed him 
from Christ? You've got some affliction. He 

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BACKSLIDERS 

has laid His hand upon you. God does not 
afflict willingly. Did you ever punish a child? 
If you did, didn't you do it for the child's good, 
and not for the pleasure of doing it? I don't 
see fathers and mothers who like to do that 
kind of thing. If they do chasten, it is for the 
child's good. If you are under the "chastening 
rod" of God, don't rebel and think God a hard 
Master. 

Now, if you want to return, there's nothing 
to hinder you but your own will. Your back- 
slidings can't keep you, because He will blot 
them all out if you'll let Him. I want to read 
a little more out of Jeremiah, because I don't 
know a better thing for the backslider than the 
Word of God. Nothing but the Word of God. 
In the Third Chapter of Jeremiah, the twelfth 
verse, "Go and proclaim these words, and say, 
Return, thou backsliding Israel, . . . and I will 
not cause my anger to fall upon you. I will 
not keep my anger forever." I want to ask you 
this question: Do you believe that if Israel had 
repented, God would have allowed Nebuchad- 
nezzar to take them down to Babylon for 
seventy years? "Go, proclaim these words. 
Say, Return. Only acknowledge thine iniquity, 
and thy transgressions against the Lord thy 
God." ' 

Of course, if we don't obey the command- 

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BACKSLIDERS 

ments of God, we have backslidden — every 
one that's breaking the laws of God is back- 
slidden. You may be in good standing in 
the Church where you belong in the city, in the 
sight of men, but not in the sight of God. The 
heart has got away, and as long as we are liv- 
ing in rebellion and disloyalty to God and his 
commandments, we cannot expect the smile of 
heaven and the blessing of God. 

Again, in the twenty-second verse of the same: 
"Return, ye backslidden children, and I will 
heal your backslidings." A man said to me, 
"Mr. Moody, I would come, but I have been so 
mean, so contemptible, that the Lord wouldn't 
receive me." I said: "That's your thought, 
and not His. Did you ever see a father and 
mother dealing with a boy who had gone astray? 
If the boy comes home with a broken heart — 
don't they receive him? " 

When I was in London in 1875, there came 
to us a request that we should pray for a boy 
gone off into the far south, to Australia. The 
father and mother seemed broken-hearted for 
their boy. He had gone far away in his sins, 
and they wanted united prayer offered for him. 
I suppose that not less than 200 people offered 
their prayer for that boy that night, one of the 
largest meetings in Agricultural Hall. Away 
off in the wilds of that country — he had to 

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BACKSLIDERS 

ride for one day to get at the post, so wild was 
the land — he got a letter telling him about 
how many had been praying for him. He 
started back, and on the way he was so over- 
come by the power of God that he could not 
ride; and he got off, and waited in the bush, 
and God converted him before he returned back 
to his hut. He wrote home of what he had 
done, what had happened. The parents cabled 
him, as quickly as they could, to come home; 
and the news came back that he was on his way 
home. Those parents were so afraid that the 
boat would get in, and he would come at night, 
that they had a bell put up, so that he could 
wake up the whole family, so anxious were 
they to give him a welcome. That's the way 
God receives backsliders. "Ring the bells of 
heaven; there is joy today/' 

The only Chapter that records joy in heaven 
is the one that tells about the prodigal's coming 
back to his father's house. If you are going to 
have a genuine work of grace in Boston, it will 
be the winning back the wanderers. So today, 
make up your mind that you will return now. 
Right here, now! This done, go right to the 
church tonight, to the church which you pre- 
fer, and if there's a social meeting going on, go 
in and tell them that you've made up your mind 
to come back. If the minister is here on the 

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BACKSLIDERS 

platform, take the first step and tell him that. 
You will do it now. Don't wait until I get 
through preaching. Why — the only place 
where God is represented as running is the 
Father to that prodigal. We read of God 
walking; but he ran then. I see the boy com- 
ing back, but I see the old man running towards 
him with arms outstretched. And, my friend, 
God will restore unto you the joy of His salva- 
tion if you'll turn back. I will read Hosea 14: 1. 
"O Israel, return unto the Lord thy God, for 
thou hast fallen by thine own iniquity. Not 
by mine." You very often hear people talking 
about other people's failings and about the 
Church. It is your own "iniquity." Don't 
let any one give that as an excuse. It's the 
devil's lie to keep you from coming back. It's 
your own iniquity that has taken you away 
from God. "Take with you words, and turn 
unto the Lord. He will receive us graciously. 
So we will render the praise of our lips." You 
will be praising God if wanderers come back. 
O friend, won't you come today? 

Then in the fourth verse. "I will heal their 
backslidings ; I will love them freely, for my 
anger is turned away from him. I will be as 
dew unto Israel. He shall grow as the lily and 
cast forth his roots as Lebanon." Think of it — 
"Heal their backslidings." And when God 

[56] 



BACKSLIDERS 

says "heal" he means every word he says. 
That's what He'll do. Is there a man or wom- 
an here today who will turn from backslid- 
ing? If so God will heal you freely. Just 
here, if you will turn from your old life, and 
you may become a ruling elder in your home. 

Do you want to come back to God? Com- 
mence where you broke off! I will call your 
attention to another fact. People, when they 
come back to the Lord, expect that they are 
going to have the same experience they had at 
first. Revelations, Second, fifth verse, "Re- 
member, therefore, and do the first works, or 
else I will come unto thee quickly, except thou 
repent." Now people expect they are going to 
have the same experience that they had when 
they first came to the Lord. God never repeats 
himself. He will give you a fresh experience. 
But you are to do the first works — repent of 
your sins; and if there's anything in your life 
that's wrong, make up your mind that you're 
going to have that wrong righted, as far as is in 
your power; but don't mock God, and ask God 
to do anything for you that you can do yourself. 
It's mockery for me to ask God to do some- 
thing that I can do myself. If I've wronged 
any one, and I can make that wrong right, let 
me go and do it. If the backslider will do that, 
and do all he can to restore where he has de- 

[57] 



BACKSLIDERS 

stroyed — consider what his influence for evil 
has been; how he has led others astray; how 
he has brought a reproach upon the cause of 
God in all his backslidings — then he will be in a 
position to turn to come back, and go to work 
all the harder. I thank God I've seen many a 
backslider restored who has proved a mighty 
instrument in God's hands. They used to 
tell me that God never used defeated men. 

We should never have had that fifty-first 
Psalm if men hadn't fallen. God, the Holy 
Ghost, helped to write that Psalm, and it has 
brought hundreds and thousands and millions 
into the Kingdom of God. And the thirty- 
second Psalm was written by a backslider. 
Again, there was that restored Peter, he that 
preached that marvellous sermon. I would 
pray this prayer: Bring them up out of the pit, 
and restore to them the joy of salvation. The 
restored Psalmist was made to become a writer 
of Psalms and Hymns. Did you ever take 
notice, ever take any pains to see, how David 
fell; to study how Peter fell? You know, they 
didn't fall all at once. Men don't go up on a 
building like this and jump off unless they want 
to commit suicide. A man goes along down 
the elevator or the stairs step by step, and 
you'll find that every man who backslides 
goes down gradually. You will see that some 

[58] 



BACKSLIDERS 

man has done an awful thing, and it comes to 
the public as a great shock; and you think 
the man has suddenly fallen. Not a bit of it. 
The work has been going on for months, for 
years; he stole slowly away from the Lord, 
and was a backslider five or ten years ago, but 
he kept it secret. By and by, he got so far 
away that he could do outrageous things, and 
down he went, and the world saw, knew his 
fall. There's Peter. The first step of Peter's 
downfall was his self-confidence. The Lord 
warned him; but Peter said: If all the rest of 
the disciples forsook the Lord, he wouldn't. 
The Lord could count on him. He w T as not 
a-going to fall. 

A friend of mine, a minister, called his church 
together some time ago, and wanted to know 
how many would stand by him if he had some 
special meetings. One man said, " I don't know 
of many, but you can count on me." That man 
got mad within three days, and wouldn't go 
into the church. That's Peter. "Lord, you 
can count on me." He reflected on John and 
James and all the rest of them. He was going 
to follow Jesus to the death. But you will 
notice that he fell on the strongest point of his 
character. The men in the Bible, the promi- 
nent men, fell on the strongest point of their 
characters. "Let him that thinketh he stand- 

[59] 



BACKSLIDERS 

eth take heed lest he fall." There's Abraham; 
for his faith he was honored; but he got down 
in the dumps, and wavered, and he denied his 
wife. He lost faith and lied, though he was 
called "The Father of the Faithful." 

Where did Moses fall? Moses, who was com- 
mended for his meekness, his humility. Why 
was he kept out of the Promised Land? Be- 
cause he lacked meekness. He smote the rock. 
Do you tell me that Moses did not fall then; 
did not backslide? Do you tell me that Abra- 
ham did not lie? Every time you tell a lie, 
you backslide. Every time you lose your 
temper and are disagreeable in your family, 
you are backsliding. Eh? You've never been 
called a backslider before, have you? Now 
ask the question: Don't you think Abraham 
backslid when he said his wife was his sister? 
What d'ye say? He was a backslider at one 
time, wasn't he? What had he to do? Tell 
me that he didn't confess that sin and take his 
place before God in the dust, in order to have 
his soul restored to fellowship with God. Do 
you tell me that Moses didn't shed tears, day 
by day, for that sin, that one act that kept him 
out of the Promised Land? I've not any doubt 
about it. 

A foolish woman in the camp, like some we 
have now, told Moses he was a most lovely 

[60] 



BACKSLIDERS 

man; and he tumbled right then. Now when 
you remember either men or women, telling a 
young convert that you'd rather hear him speak 
than the minister, you'll spoil him. Many have 
been spoiled in that way. And when he thinks 
he is strong, down he goes — he backslides. A 
man who hasn't humility is in a backslidden 
state. If he wants to puff himself up, and he 
says I, I, I, I, and the "I" goes forward, and 
he thinks more of himself than of any one 
else, he is in a backslidden state; I don't care 
who he is. I got a letter from a man who had 
his photograph on the outside of the envelope 
— on the outside. He advertised himself as a 
prominent worker, which I think he was. Then 
the paper had another big photograph of him; 
and he had two notices printed — notices of 
his photograph — and I got four photographs. 
Yes, I felt as if the man had backslidden. What 
does the Bible say? It says something like 
this: "Pride goeth before a fall." If a man or a 
woman gets puffed up, isn't he or she in danger 
of tumbling? Isn't that the first step to back- 
sliding? Didn't the Lord see it in Peter? Did 
you ever notice that everything these men did 
before they were filled with the Holy Ghost, 
they had to undo? There was nothing worth 
recording until they were filled with the Spirit 
of God. Elijah was noted for his boldness. He 

[61] 



BACKSLIDERS 

stood on Carmel and called on the four hundred 
prophets of the Grove and four hundred and 
fifty of Baal, and it looked as if every man was 
keen against him. He stood there alone, the 
boldest man on the face of the earth. But he 
got his eyes off the Master, and when he received 
a message from the queen, he fled and hid under 
a juniper tree, and wished himself dead. That 
bold man of Carmel tumbled. Perhaps he had 
been elated with his successes. It was all to 
prove to himself how weak he was away from 
God. We are all as weak as water. "Let him 
that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he 
fall." The Lord knew that Peter was weak, 
and he warned him, and told him he was 
going to deny him. But Peter thought he knew 
better than the Lord. Another case: take 
James and John, both noted for meekness and 
humility; yet these are the men who wanted to 
call fire down from heaven. Christ said: "I 
have not come to destroy but to give life." 
Here is Peter; he falling on the strongest point 
of his character; he, the very man who was 
going to follow Christ right on to death; noth- 
ing could separate them. 

Now, note the next step in Peter's downfall. 
He was self-confident, and the next thing was 
he went to sleep when the Lord told him to 
watch. The most dangerous thing that can 

[62] 



BACKSLIDERS 

happen to a child of God is to go to sleep. If 
Satan can get the conscience to sleep, he can 
do strange things with it. The Lord told Peter 
to "watch with him one hour"; but Peter went 
to sleep. If he had watched that hour, do you 
think he would have got right up and denied 
the Master? If he had obeyed the Lord he 
could not have backslidden; but he went to 
sleep. Some of the strangest things happen in 
the Church of God today, unaccountable things, 
unless you make up your mind that the doers 
have gone to sleep. Fathers and mothers 
spend all their time, or nearly all, accumulating 
worldly things, and though their children all 
around them are going to ruin, they don't seem 
to realize it. Some of these are good people too; 
you can't say they are not Christian people. 

A lady brought a boy three thousand miles 
across the continent that I might try to lead him 
to Christ. She said I had some influence over 
him. He was soon mixed up with the worst 
company in the town. I said: "It is strange 
to think that that boy has come from a beautiful 
Christian home, and here he is going around 
with the very worst scamps of the town." I 
went to that Western home. I was invited to 
spend a while there. I thought I would like 
to see how it was that that woman had three 
sons all gone to ruin. One night her husband 

[63] 



BACKSLIDERS 

opened my door and began to weep: "I don't 
know why God has treated me in this way! I 
have three sons, and every one is a disgrace to 
my name ! " I said, "Let me ask a few questions. 
Man, where do you spend your Monday nights, for 
instance? " "Well," with hesitation, "I'm an 
alderman and belong to the Common Council." 
"Where do you go Tuesday nights?" "I am a 
Senior Deacon in the lodge." " Where do you 
go Wednesday night?" He didn't want to tell. 
He belonged to the Masons, was a high Mason. 
"But Thursday night I'm always at home." I 
ask: "You are a popular man and trying to 
be elected Mayor of the city, and if you don't 
have political calls elsewhere, you have com- 
pany?" "Yes." "How is it Friday night?" 
" Friday night I always go to prayer meeting." 
" How about Saturday night? " " Saturday night 
I'm always at home." I said, "I was here Satur- 
day night, but I noticed you locked yourself up 
to get sleep. How about Sunday night? ' : I 
said, "Good friend, listen: you get up in the 
morning, and you are a business man and you 
hurry through breakfast; and the boys, they 
hurry through also and go off to play. Sometimes 
you have family worship and sometimes you 
don't. Sometimes you have it alone, and some- 
times some of the children are there." He ad- 
mitted that that was so. " You don't come home 

[64] 



BACKSLIDERS 

for lunch. You have a late dinner, and you see 
your children at dinner time; and the fact is 
you've been trying to be a good man, and you've 
looked after other people's vineyards and ne- 
glected your own. Satan is walking and you've 
been asleep all the time. If a man were trying 
to break into your house to steal your silver, it 
would keep you home and awake. You've 
been prominent in the Church and in the City 
Council, and are now trying to run for Mayor. 
I would let the Mayor's office go, and try to 
save my boy." 

It seems to me, if Satan can get the Church 
to sleep, he can do almost anything with it. I 
believe the family was established long before 
the Church, and my duty is to my family first. 
I am not to neglect my family. I don't believe 
our children would go the way so many are 
going, if we cared for them more. I don't 
believe these gambling dens, these brothels and 
whiskey shops would be crowded with young 
men, night after night, if the Christian people 
were up and wide awake. I think we have 
gone to sleep. What d'ye say? How is it? 
Some people say that God has not been true to 
His promise, and has not treated them right. 
My friend, let us look after our own vineyard 
first. It seems to me that every man should 
give one or two nights a week to his own family; 

[65] 



BACKSLIDERS 

at least it is not necessary to keep up with the 
clubs, nor to keep them up. I heard this story: 
A boy came in crying, and the mother wanted 
to know what the matter was. "A man struck 
me." "What man?" "That man that comes 
here every Sunday." That was about as much 
as the child knew about his own father. Now, 
if we go to sleep, we can't expect anything else. 
Peter went to sleep. What's the next thing? 
He fought in the energy of the flesh. He cut 
off the servant's ear. The Lord didn't come 
down from heaven and cut off the ears; not by 
a good deal. He wanted the servant to have 
two ears. That's the only mortal that ever 
lost anything personal from Christ or his dis- 
ciples while they were on earth. And the Lord 
healed that ear. The man wasn't around with 
head tied up for six months. The Lord healed 
it. Peter fought in the energy of the flesh. 
Where do Church quarrels come from? In the 
"energy of the flesh." A coldness has come in 
and a midnight slumber has fallen on the 
Church. Men will talk in their sleep, and what 
talks we have. But men never work in their 
sleep, and that's the trouble. Well, Peter 
fought in the energy of the flesh, and the Lord 
had to undo the evil. A great many crooked 
things have to be straightened. 

The next thing: Peter went far off. You see 

[66] 



BACKSLIDERS 

he is backsliding now. A minister told me that 
if he wanted to get his Elders together, he would 
have to go to the theater; the only time he 
could get them together was at the theater. I 
want to tell you something: An Elder, one of 
those Elders, had a son who was as the apple of 
his eye. That son drifted off, and lived a false 
life. When he married a pure, virtuous woman, 
a woman, a companion of the past, turned 
'round and shot him dead, and the father's grey 
hairs went down in sorrow to the grave. You 
don't gain anything by following the Lord afar 
off, I tell you. When a man follows the Lord 
afar off, he cannot testify for Jesus Christ, can 
he? If I wanted to introduce a man to another 
man, and the man was away up at the upper 
end of the gallery, I wouldn't say, "Dr. Schofield, 
I want to introduce you to a gentleman away 
up there." You've got to be near the Lord, 
haven't you, to introduce others to Him? Now 
Peter was afar off. That's where we are back- 
sliding. People at a distance don't see any 
resemblance between us and Christ. 

A friend of mine was walking up the streets 
of Philadelphia, when he saw a church-member 
in one of the saloons, playing cards. He got 
out a card and wrote on it, "Ye are my wit- 
nesses." "Take that in," he said to a boy, "and 
leave it with the man there." The man took it 

[67] 



BACKSLIDERS 

and read it, and said to the boy, "Who gave 
you that card?" "A stranger going by." And 
the man looked up and down the street, and 
sneaked off home. That church-member was 
following the Lord afar off, wasn't he? If a man 
goes to a saloon and gets drunk, he is following 
afar off, isn't he? What d'ye say? If a man 
will go to the billiard halls, or go to "set up for 
the drinks," is he a true professed Christian? 
What d'ye say? Now, that's the point. Let 
us see if we have got away from the Lord. If 
we have, we can't expect to have the Lord 
use us. 

The next thing is that we find Peter with the 
enemies of Christ, and one said to him, "You 
were with his disciples. " "I don't know Him." 
A girl came in, a little maid, and Peter got 
roused up. And that bold man, that was 
going to follow Christ, is frightened by the little 
maid. When we get away from the Lord, we 
are cowards. When a man is right with the 
Lord, he has courage. That's what is going to 
give him boldness; but when he is wrong, he is 
a coward. Peter is a coward now. Another 
came along, and said, "His speech betrays him." 
No man can be with Christ for three years but 
his speech will betray him. I've got a back- 
slider on his knees, and I've said, "This man 
knows the language of Zion; this man has been 

[68] 



BACKSLIDERS 

a Christian." I've said/' You've been a Christian 
some day. How do I know? By the way you 
pray." You can tell by Peter's language. "His 
speech betray eth him." And Peter went further. 
He began to swear and curse that he never knew 
Christ. He got pretty low. You see how. He 
was self-confident; then fell asleep; then fought 
in the energy of the flesh; then followed afar off; 
and now he turns and denies Him. 

LISTEN! Did you ever notice how quickly 
the Lord won him back? When he was cursing, 
the Lord gave him one look. That's all! Satan 
had been at work on Peter for some time, but 
one look won him back. The Lord might have 
said, "Peter, is it true that you've forgotten me 
so soon? Do you remember when I gave you 
that great haul of fish, and you wanted me to 
depart from you, for you were a sinful man? 
Do you remember when your wife's mother lay 
sick of a fever, and I restored her to health? 
Is it true, Peter, that you have forgotten me so 
soon? Do you know that you were with me 
when I raised Jairus' daughter? Do you re- 
member how you were with me on the Holy 
Mount, and you wanted to make three taber- 
nacles, one for Moses, and one for Elias, and 
one for me? Have you forgotten me so soon? 
And do you remember you said you would never 
forsake me?" 

[69] 



BACKSLIDERS 

The Lord turned and gave him one look of 
love, and that broke Peter's heart, and he went 
out to weep bitterly. My God loves you. Do 
as Peter did. Come back to the Lord and He 
will bless you and use you a thousand times 
more than He ever did in the past! 



[70] 



HOW TO DEAL WITH INQUIRERS* 

" In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not 
thine hand." Ecclesiastes xi. 6. 

SOME one made the remark that our meet- 
ings had put Boston ten years back. 
Thank God if you've got back that far, 
for I think you were in a better condition ten 
years ago than you are now. We have made 
progress if we have got back ten years. I hope 
you will get back still further. Some one says 
I've hurt the feelings of a good many by what 
I said about the Church. My! My feelings 
have been hurt terribly by the conditions I have 
found here. I think the time has come to have 
the feelings hurt all round — so hurt that we 
shall get up and do something. 

Last Friday I read an extract from an address 
by one of the leading ministers of the country. 
I will read it; it is by Dr. Withrow, Moderator 
of the last General Assembly. 

"The Rev. J. H. Withrow, Moderator of the 
General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, 
preached last Sunday a sermon commemorative 
of the tenth anniversary of the beginning of his 

* Delivered at Tremont Temple, Boston, January 18, 1897. 

[71] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

ministry as Pastor of the Third Presbyterian 
Church of Chicago. (And that is the largest 
Presbyterian church in the United States.) 
His text was: 'Hitherto hath the Lord helped 
us.' In his discourse, referring to the changes 
in Chicago, he said: 'How is it? Is the city 
better or worse than it was ten years ago? 
Truly we cannot say/ (I think I can say. It 
is ten times worse.) When telling of the fact 
that where there were three thousand rum holes 
when I came there, and the number has in- 
creased now to seven thousand — (He didn't 
know whether it had grown better or worse!) 
'When we read in the daily papers of people 
afraid to walk the best-lighted boulevards after 
dark, lest they be sand-bagged; and when we 
hear of the Departments of Justice administered 
in such a way that the salaried officers can 
arrange to get a fortune in a few years, with no 
known resources but the evil ones to draw upon; 
and when our City Council is openly and de- 
fiantly charged by its own members with cor- 
rupt legislation, and the leaders in wrong-doing 
can find defenders among our most prominent, 
and, we have thought, patriotic citizens; and 
when the feeling is general that any rascal can 
cheat the Law out of its penalty, if he has 
money — then we think that the city is sinking 
into the abyss that hurled Rome to ruin." 

[72] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

That's the Moderator of the General Assem- 
bly of the Presbyterians! His church is in the 
Broadway district, where there are a hundred 
thousand people; and, to my knowledge, there's 
not a place, unless some Rescue Mission, where 
there's a thing being done for the Master. This 
is on one of the most public boulevards, and 
what the papers said is true — people dare not 
walk out there at night. And, right near that 
church, in that district, there's been, on an 
average, a murder right along month after 
month. And yet, that church, and nearly 
every church in Chicago, is opened only two 
or three hours in the week. 

Now there are theaters! Supposing that 
Church hired a theater and had some one preach 
in it every Sunday, in the heart of that district 
where it is so dark; supposing that the theaters 
were engaged — they open the churches only 
once on the Sabbath; some of them are open 
twice, but a good many of them only once, and 
few attend. Why? On account of the "pew 
system." 

A gentleman said in New York: "Are you 
going to fall into that idea of keeping the church 
opened every night in the week? What do we 
want of more members? Every pew is taken, 
and we pay all of our expenses. We don't 
believe in the second service, and one is enough." 

[73] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

Said I: "Look at the state of things we are 
having!" Here is something I cut from a 
religious newspaper. I thought at first I would 
never speak of it; it was so humiliating. "There 
were thirteen hundred and ninety-five Congre- 
gational churches that received no accessions 
by confession of faith during the last year for 
which the statistics have been collected. Many 
of this number of Congregationalist churches, 
or more than one-fourth of the total, gathered 
no sheaves out of the field, which is the world. 
There were seven hundred and fifty Presbyterian 
churches that did not report any additions by 
confession of faith." It is perhaps safe to say 
that every fifth church among the great bodies 
of believers in this "Mighty Religion" witnessed 
no addition through faith-increase in twelve 
months. Now, these are facts that you get 
from statistics. Isn't it time that the Church 
should be stirred? Isn't it time that something 
should be done? 

Now, I want to say — because there are a 
good many ministers here, and Church offi- 
cers — I want to say I believe that if these men 
conducted their business in the way the Church 
business is conducted at the present day, they 
would be bankrupt in six months; and if the 
newspapers did so, they'd close up their business 
inside of the same period. 

[74] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

I think it a calamity when a minister comes to 
preaching only once a week, and then is so over- 
worked as to need a vacation. He tires himself 
out preaching about thirty sermons a year. 
What do you say? Am I "hurting your feel- 
ings"? It is hurting feelings all around. These 
reporters ask something new and sensational! 
I wish they would hunt up those statistics and 
find out if Boston is better than ten years ago. 
It may be, and may not be! You know. Let 
a little light in! 

Another thing, about working up our meet- 
ings. They had a meeting in Carnegie Hall 
last Friday night, and they were going to have 
a "Mission Rally. " I forget how many de- 
nominations assisted. They had Dr. Storrs 
give one of his magnificent addresses; and 
Bishop Fowler of the Methodist Church was 
there. They were going to have a "Great 
Rally " in Carnegie Hall. But they say it wasn't 
one-half, or one-third, full. Why? Lack of 
advertising. Suppose they had spent fifty dol- 
lars in advertising? When we started out in 
'93 — at the World's Fair in '93 — I got religious 
notices into the Amusement columns, and some 
of the religious papers said: "You are degrading 
religion." I replied: "Let's get down where 
the people are." We had five theaters run- 
ning every Sunday, with at least a hundred and 

[75] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

ten meetings right along. But we spent the 
money advertising. You say: "We can't get the 
money"? Pass the hat around when you meet 
each other. Make one hand wash the other. 
You can get it. There's no inspiration talking 
to empty pews. Preachers must fill the pews 
or move. I don't believe a man who has a call 
from God to preach is called to preach to empty 
pews. 

I was invited to Brooklyn some time ago to 
speak; and the man who drove me over left 
me at the wrong church. I looked up, and all 
the notice I could find was the undertaker's. 
I went from church to church, to find out where 
I was going to preach; I finally went into one 
and saw the minister who had invited me, and 
I knew I was at the right place. But that 
church wasn't half full. I would have had three 
or four churches, if they had taken the pains to 
advertise. Now, the idea of no notices except 
the undertaker's sign out! That's a nice way 
for doing business. (Laughter.) You laugh 
at it. You find church after church with no 
notices, Jewish synagogue, Roman Catholic, 
and Protestant. 

When we were in London, we would have 
forty or fifty churches in a district, and we had 
notices on every one of those churches, and every 
church had to advertise its meetings. Every 

[76] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

one belonging to one of those churches was more 
or less committed to the movement, and we 
filled the buildings right along. We had ten 
thousand people at every meeting, and for eight 
months. Now, people are shocked if you dare 
put notices out that you are going to have 
meetings in that church. Put up a big bulletin 
board, and don't be afraid. I had to get some 
bulletin boards to carry around to the churches, 
and they had to read them on Sunday. 

We have got to have more "shocks"! Don't 
be afraid of them. I heard a good thing in 
New York this time. They'd got a man into 
a Rescue Mission, who said, "It's a lie! It's a 
lie! You say that Jesus will save sinners. It's 
a lie! You're a sham! I sought him all last 
night! I didn't see anything!" Another rose 
up and said: "It isn't a lie. I was a thief and 
he saved me, and I've been saved five years." 
Another said: "I was a drunkard, and I've 
been saved for four years." Every man was 
ready to defend the cause. It isn't a bad thing 
to have a shock once in a while. The idea that 
there are four thousand churches that hadn't 
had an addition in one year, by profession of 
faith! How long will it take to reach this 
world? Some people will say "you hurt our 
feelings." Very well; let us hurt their feelings 
until something is done. A good many of us 

[77] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

have special meetings. Put a notice in the 
papers that you are going to have meetings; 
then have people go through all the district and 
invite other people out; do this and I'll tell 
you, if you keep at it, there will be no trouble 
about filling your church. How did I get a 
reputation? I had to go out and ask people to 
come to hear me speak. I used to have a band 
of men who would invite people to come and 
hear Moody. Who's he? It's my business to 
let it be known that I am going to preach. The 
men who were asked would go down a block and 
get another invitation; and so every block they 
went, they were getting invitations. That's the 
way I got my audiences. But, you say: "I 
wouldn't like that. It's not dignified." 

My friend, let dignity go! That's not one 
of the "fruits of the Spirit"! Don't you know 
we've got too much dignity? What we want is 
to "get 'em" for the Master. I notice these 
reporters don't care much for dignities! When 
the Church gets as wide awake as the Press, we 
shall have things done. 

V I think you will find that almost every person 
here whom God has used has had some other per- 
son to help him into the light; and I believe that 
is the secret of all Christian work. If the Church 
of God should go into training today for that 
work, we should have a different state of things. 

[78] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

There are four kinds of meetings that, I think, 
every church should have. First, there's the 
building up — the feeding of the flock. That's 
now done, as a general thing, all over Christen- 
dom every Sunday morning. That seems to me 
to be the proper time. Perhaps the minister 
couldn't do better to build up his flock and 
instruct them than in the morning. Then, 
there's another service, in which we meet to- 
gether to pray for one another and for the 
Church. Then, there ought to be a praise 
service, more suited to praise than to prayer, 
and the really true Church will be a Praise 
Church as much as a Prayer Church. Then, 
there's a service when we come together to work, 
not so much to hear from man as to hear from 
God — where we meet around the Lord's Table, 
and where we let God speak to us. I don't 
believe that Christians are going to conquer 
who don't have some time alone with God. 

I was very much touched, a few years ago, 

when my little boy, my youngest He is 

quite small. I was in my study, and I told my 
wife I didn't want to be disturbed; I wanted to 
be uninterrupted. I got on a line of truth and 
was tracing it, every word, through the Scrip- 
tures, when I heard a gentle knock at the door. 
I said: "I don't want to be interrupted now." 
But the knocking kept on. I said, "Come in!" 

[79] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

My little boy entered. I thought, "I can dis- 
pose of him." "Paul," I said, "what do you 
want?" He answered, "I don't want anything, 
only to be with you." I couldn't put him out 
then. Not by a good deal. I went to the closet 
and got some toys and spread them out on the 
floor before the little fellow, and I said, as he 
looked up at me: "The dear little fellow wants 
to be with me!" I think there are times when 
the Lord wants us to be with Him, not only 
when we come to ask for something, but when 
He comes to ask for something. So there are 
times when we ought to be alone and let God 
talk with us. 

Now the service that I want to speak of 
ought to be followed by an after meeting, a 
meeting where the Gospel is proclaimed. I 
make a marked distinction between the build- 
ing up of the Church, the flock, and the prayer 
meeting, and the Christian Endeavor meeting; 
the meeting of praise, the prayer meeting, and 
the Gospel hand-work. I believe we ought to 
have one service every week, and that Sabbath 
evening, all over Christendom, is the best time 
for a Gospel address, where the claims of Christ 
are pressed upon the people and where Christ 
is lifted up as the hope of this world. I believe 
that, every Sabbath, we should have that in the 
length and breadth of this land. Look at the 

[80] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

multitudes we would have in most of our 
churches, and they would be added to the 
Church of God. And when there comes more 
or less of an awakening, then there should be 
important special meetings every night. 

Listen! If a man gets awakened on Sunday 
night — suppose he is a drinking man; sup- 
pose the man has some besetting sin, and he 
doesn't get any sympathy at home, and all his 
associates are bad — he is impressed on Sabbath 
evening, and you don't have another meet- 
ing until the next Sabbath night, the seed is 
sown, but the devil catches it away; but if you 
had meetings Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, 
possibly he may be reached. He is wounded 
deeper on Monday night, on Tuesday night, and 
on Wednesday, and he comes to you asking, 
"What shall I do to be saved?" That's the 
advantage of special meetings. I think if we 
could have meetings about a month in your 
church, and let your progressive euchre go, and 
all that sort of business go for a month, and 
hold the church to that one thing, we should 
have thousands and tens of thousands added to 
the church membership, and there would not be 
three or four thousand churches reporting no 
accessions. 

Now I come to the after meeting. I never 
think of having an after meeting until the 

[81] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

impression is made. You ought to have an 
" atmosphere." And if you attempt to have 
after meetings before the people are ready, it 
does more harm than good. You may be hav- 
ing a meeting to pray; but when you have an 
after meeting, you ask inquirers to rise, to go 
to the altar, or to go to another room. What 
you want is to have people commit themselves, 
if it is no more than to raise their hands. Nine- 
tenths of the battle is won if I can get a man 
to express interest; it gives a chance to get at 
him and follow him up. That's the importance 
of having some way of getting at the people, 
and getting them to express their desire to be 
Christians. 

There's one thing you want to break up in 
New England, and that's this awful "stiffness." 
It is a calamity! Why, some men will kill a 
meeting by their way of coming into it; slow as 
a snail. Then, they drop into a seat, and when 
they get up, they do it in such a stiff, formal 
way, that there's a blanket thrown over all the 
meeting. By and by the people take out their 
watches to see what time has passed. You 
never see such people back again. That's the 
end of it. But that stiffness! Break it up! 
How are you going to do it? If it is a social 
meeting, or a prayer meeting, have it begin 
when people don't know when it has begun. 

[82] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

Instead of getting in behind the pulpit, get down 
among the people, and say, "What shall we 
sing tonight?" The meeting is going on before 
they know it. It is very easy. If it is an after 
meeting — there are two ways of having an 
after meeting — one way is to "kill it," the 
other way is to have it "go." 

I was travelling with a Glasgow minister, 
precise in his orthodoxy. We were on a train, 
and he said, "Moody, we've been trying your 
American way of having an inquiry meeting, 
and it doesn't work in Scotland." "But," I 
replied, "the best inquiry meetings I've had, 
have been in Scotland." My words didn't 
work with that pastor. He told me he had had 
a minister come over from Edinburgh, and he 
said: "We thought we would try it, but we 
didn't get an inquirer." I'll tell you how he 
did it. He had his Edinburgh friend, a mighty 
speaker, preach a powerful sermon, and he made 
a deep impression, and the whole audience was 
moved. I've no doubt of it. When he had 
finished the sermon, he got up and said: "Eh, 
if there's anybody concerned about his soul, he'd 
better," etc., etc., "your Edinburgh friend w T ill 
meet you in the Session Room." He had a 
great, big "IF" and fired it off before the 
people, and he gave the audience the impres- 
sion that he didn't expect anybody, and it 

[83] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

would have taken an earthquake to have got 
the cool-headed Scotchmen to walk up. I 
said, "That's just what made the failure." 

The Scotchman asked, "How would you have 
done it?" "I'll tell you, " I replied; "I would 
have sprung up and said: 'Now, if any of 
you have got to go out, you can go quietly; 
but I would have put the 'IF 5 in such a way 
that would show I didn't expect anybody to 
act on my permission. Perhaps there wouldn't 
have been a soul that would have left. Then I 
would say: 'All you who are not Christians, 
just come in here, and we'll have a meeting by 
ourselves, and all the Christians stay out here 
and pray.'" "Well," said the Scotchman, "I 
don't think that would work." It has worked 
right along for twenty-five years, and it is 
working. It worked very well in Scotland. It 
makes all the difference in the world where you 
put the "IF." 

When Mr. Aitken was working among the 
Episcopalians, the Presbyterians had a meeting 
in their own church, and a very able man 
preached as he had never preached before for 
thirty years. The Spirit of the Lord came back 
upon him, and there was a hush of attention 
upon the audience, and one of the Elders said: 
"Now look here, Doctor; instead of pronounc- 
ing the benediction, why not do as the Episco- 

[84] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

palians do — have an after meeting?" He said, 
"We Presbyterians never liked that kind of a 
meeting." "But they get hold of the people, 
and why shouldn't we? They are as conserva- 
tive as we Presbyterians, and they have inquiry 
meetings down at Trinity and St. George's, and 
if the Episcopalians do it, why shouldn't we?" 
"I'll try it, but there won't any one come. 
But, I'll try it." 

The next time he said, "If there's any one 
who is concerned about his soul and will meet 
the Session in the Session Room, they will be 
glad to see him." There wasn't a soul went in. 
"I tried your plan," he said, "but you see it 
didn't w r ork. I didn't expect anything. You 
might just as well have asked them to go before 
a Justice of the Peace." 

I remember that I went before an Examining 
Committee in Doctor Kirk's church. I was 
scared out of my w 7 its at the thought of going 
before that body of great men to be examined 
— about theology! If I hadn't been awakened, 
I wouldn't have gone. I had been converted, 
and I got in. Though they kept me out as long 
as they could, I'm still there. They haven't 
got me out yet. If you want to get hold of 
people, you must make it very easy, social like. 
Break up this stiffness and get at the people. 

A minister once said: "How shall we have an 

[85] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

inquiry meeting in the same room where we 
preach ?" It makes no difference. Have it in 
the chapel, or downstairs, or right in the room. 
It makes no difference. The minister should 
know all his people. Then, if there are people 
there who are not Christians, and he gets con- 
verts, he is to "inquire" with them. The way 
to manage an after meeting is like this: Make 
the first service short, so that men w T ill not 
look at their watches. If I get through sooner 
than they expect, they will say, "Dear me, I 
didn't believe he would be through in a half 
hour," and they will stay. 

Now, we are going to have a meeting of per- 
haps twenty -five or thirty minutes. And if I 
preached twenty -five minutes, I would say: "I'd 
like to have you all stay." I'm going to put the 
Word of Life plainly. I have tried Carnegie Hall 
Sunday nights. I've been there since the first of 
November, every Sunday night, and we get "the 
Way" before them plainer than in the first ser- 
mon, with the workers all around. They are 
upstairs and downstairs, and they go to the 
strange people and talk with them. I have quiet 
singing, "Just as I am, without one plea," or, "I 
hear Thy welcome voice." All over the house I 
move about. I am in personal contact with those 
I want. We get the names and follow the people 
up; next you hear of conversions. 

[86] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

I heard of eight who came forward and joined 
one church. I believe that could be done all 
over this city. I believe we shall find inquirers, 
if we will make up our minds to try. I believe 
there's a greater awakening among the uncon- 
verted than among the church-members; that's 
my honest opinion. I am amazed to learn how 
the people search the newspapers for reports of 
our meetings. I got a letter from San Francisco 
recently, telling about the reading of the work 
in the newspapers. Let them preach against 
it, and preach against it! One man says I will 
drive people away from the Bible, if I insist 
upon the old doctrines. Well, I've never driven 
a man aw T ay on account of that, for he was 
driven away before. Some people talk about 
"backsliding," but they were people who never 
went upward. 

Let us get back to the subject. What we 
want is to get a personal interest. Here is an 
incident of one of our young men in Chicago. 
We went out, in Chicago, from house to house, 
and from street to street, to get hold of people, 
and I took one of the colporteur's books, a sort 
of letter of introduction, that I might have an 
excuse to speak to this man. He protested that 
he didn't want the book. But I wanted to talk 
with him about his soul. The man got inter- 
ested and bought the book. He was five miles 

[87] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

away from our meetings; but he came that five 
miles to tell that he and his wife were converted, 
and he wanted more books, that others might 
enjoy his experience. There's no doubt about 
reaching the people if the right way is taken. 

Let us come down to personal work. I know 
that there's a class of people who tell you that 
these after meetings do harm. The minister 
has made an impression; he has sowed the seed, 
and you don't want to disturb it. My friends, 
listen! When you sow your seed, if you know 
about farming, you know the farmer must har- 
row it in and brush it in. These are meetings 
to "harrow it in." These solemn impressions 
that the minister makes are weeded out in- 
side of twenty-four hours, if you don't follow 
them up. 

Another thing: Ministers make a mistake if 
they don't get to work. If personal work is not 
used, the people will go away to whist parties, 
dancing parties, progressive euchre, and to 
things of that sort. Lord Overton was brought 
up with wine on his table and Scotch whiskey, 
brought right up with it, and he told me how he 
gave it up. He said he was trying to lead a 
young man, in his position in life, to Christ, 
and he knew that the only hope for this young 
man was his giving up the practice of liquor 
drinking. He said: "I was so afraid he would 

[88] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

talk with me and ask me if I didn't drink. He 
did do that very thing, and I said: 'I won't 
drink again." And now Lord Overton will not 
touch drink. Why? Because he wanted to be 
of use to God. Since I have been trying to lead 
men to Christ, if I find anything in my life that 
hinders my usefulness, I give it up. 

I believe if you will only get the ministers to 
stir the church-members to work, you will have 
success in the work. If you don't, then Satan 
will. If a minister has twenty, thirty or forty 
Christian men and women scattered through 
the audience, and they go to people they know, 
who are not Christians, I tell you there'll be 
accessions to the church every communion, 
right along. 

Now you will say: "Tell us how to do it." 
I have had people ask me how to do it. You 
take an infidel, or a man who doesn't believe 
in the Divinity of Christ. Listen! You can't 
lay down rules. Of all of the people that I have 
talked to, I don't know that I have talked to 
two in just the same way in my life. I never 
tell a man my experience. Why? A man is 
awakened, and if I tell a man my experience, 
he will begin to look for my experience right 
away, and he will never have it. A man will say: 
"I was converted the same way St. Paul was." 
I don't believe it- God never repeats himself. 

[89] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

No two people were ever converted in the 
same way in all the history of the world. No 
two people look alike. Now, if we wanted to 
make people look alike, and walk alike, we 
would make moulds, and if they didn't fit 
them, we would break their bones, every bone 
in their bodies. It would be awfully monoto- 
nous, wouldn't it, if all looked alike and 
talked alike? 

Men say if a man isn't converted suddenly, 
"It is all nonsense." Sometimes men are con- 
verted suddenly; but at other times it's as the 
morning sunrise. You can't tell just when the 
light began to dispel the darkness. There are 
no two cases exactly alike. Suppose men asked 
Bartimeus how he got his sight. Bartimeus 
would say: "He didn't send me to any pool; 
he filled my eyes with mud." "Why," they 
say; "we never heard of such a thing." "Yes, 
he just spoke and I was cured." No two were 
converted alike. Take Nicodemus and the 
woman at the well. It would have been a rank 
poison to have given Nicodemus what Christ 
gave that woman, or the woman what he gave 
Nicodemus. What may be good medicine for 
one may be poison for another. Nicodemus 
needed a different treatment from the woman 
at the well. Take Paul, the persecutor, and 
take Matthew, the publican. You've got to 

[90] 



DEAL WITH INQUIRERS 

deal with those two men altogether differently. 
Or, take the publican and the Pharisee. Take 
the two sons in the Fifteenth of Luke, the elder 
brother and the other brother, and you can't 
deal with the two men alike. Take the two men 
in the parable — the one who said he would go, 
and didn't, and the other who repented and 
went. Jacob and Esau were different. You 
can't lay down rules. If a man is in the Spirit 
of God, and knows God, and knows how to 
"divide the Word," and is all right, God will 
teach him in that hour what to say. 

Now I want to say to the workers : You have 
a good opportunity to work. I was at Faneuil 
Hall, Friday, and I've not seen anything in 
America for years that so cheered me. I be- 
lieve there were a hundred men in that hall 
who might have been led to the light. We are 
praying for the Call of God. Go forward! 
Now, if you want a jewel to sparkle in the 
Saviour's crown, come down and work. The 
time has come for personal work, and if you are 
ready, God is ready. You talk about the "fa- 
vored time to favor Zion. " God's time is NOW. 
Let us take things at flood tide. Workers with 
God! I thank God I'm in the fight and the 
battle is on! 



[91] 



THE S®UL WINNER* 

** And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, 
some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting 
contempt: and they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of 
the firmament, and they that turn many to righteousness, as the 
stars forever and ever. 9 ' Daniel xii. 2, 3. 

THE Twelfth Chapter of the Prophecy of 
Daniel, the second and third verses. "And 
many of them that sleep in the dust of the 
earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and 
some to shame and everlasting contempt: and 
they that be wise shall shine as the brightness 
of the firmament; and they that turn many to 
righteousness, as the stars forever and ever." 
Let me read that third verse again. 

Now, mark you, these are not the words of 
some hot-headed Evangelist, the words of some 
young man in the flush of youth, but they are 
the words of an old statesman who stood as 
high in his day as Bismarck ever stood in Ger- 
many, or Gladstone in England, or any states- 
man that we have ever had in this country. 

In the evening of his life this is the testimony 
of that grand and noble character — Daniel. 
Fifty years before, he had been taken as a cap- 

* Delivered in Boston, January 28, 1897, in Tremont Temple. 

[92] 



THE SOUL WINNER 

tive in Jerusalem and led down by Nebuchad- 
nezzar into Babylon. If some one had predicted 
that this young man was going to outrank 
Nebuchadnezzar and surpass Darius or Bel- 
shazzar, he would have been considered a 
lunatic. And yet, we find that was what 
happened. This man outlived all the men of 
his day. I don't know that we should have 
known anything about Nebuchadnezzar, Bel- 
shazzar, Darius, or Cyrus, if they hadn't been 
connected with this man. 

People talk about "hard roads." That man 
had a harder road than any one in this day ever 
thought of — taken as a captive into a nation 
of idolaters whose language he didn't under- 
stand, and whose people looked down on the 
Jews with greater contempt than on any other 
nation under the sun. Despite all the opposi- 
tion and obstacles, the captive Daniel rose and 
shone brighter than almost any other man on 
the pages of history; outshone any man of the 
five hundred years before him or of the five 
hundred years after him; and he has been 
growing for two thousand five hundred years, 
and still he shines, and will shine on. If he 
shines so brightly down here in this dark world, 
how much brighter must he shine in that world 
to which he has gone! "They that be wise 
shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; 

[93] 



THE SOUL WINNER 

and they that turn many to righteousness, as 
the stars forever and ever." 

4/ Now, the fact is all men like to shine, and the 
quicker you find that out, the better. Business 
men — all the business men here in Boston are 
struggling to get at the head. A man says: 
"If I can stand at the head of the commercial 
world, I shall be satisfied." There is a great 
struggle going on. Go to Harvard, and you 
will find the men there interested in their pro- 
fessions, each wanting to stand at the head. 
These reporters — every one of them — want 
to excel, and every newspaper wants to beat 
the other; every soldier wants to rise to the 
head of the army, where he is going "to shine." 
All our statesmen are anxious to be at the head; 
they want to get to the White House. And the 
mother, she has a boy at school, and if he gets 
to the head of his class, she manages to let 
everybody know it. If he is valedictorian, she 
will let it be known. You all want to be known. 

w You all want to shine. 

Now, here Daniel tells us who are going to 
shine; and you know there is no fiction about 
it. There's nothing said about the millionaires 
going to shine. I suppose they had millionaires 
down there in Babylon; they had the great of 
the nations of the earth, and the wealth of the 
earth flowed into Babylon; and there were 

[94] 



THE SOUL WINNER 

many who built up families; but we don't 
know. They don't shine. They may glitter 
for a short time, but it doesn't last. 

We are not told that the business men are 
going to shine forever and ever. Daniel didn't 
tell us that the politicians and statesmen are 
going to shine forever, and I think he was a 
statesman who stood as high as anybody of that 
land. But he didn't shine as a statesman. 
" They that be wise shall shine.' 99 That's what he 
says. Oh, hear it! "They that turn many to 
righteousness." "He that winneth souls is 
wise." That's the teaching of Scripture. Very 
few men can get at the head of an army. Very 
few can stand very high in the navy or in busi- 
ness. Nearly seventy per cent, of those going 
into business fail. Look at the failures all around 
you ! How few pull through ! " He that winneth 
souls is wise." The fact is that the glory of this 
world is transient. It passes away. 

I was in Paris in '67. When Napoleon III 
passed through the streets of that city the peo- 
ple went wild. It was the Exposition year, and 
everybody was stretching his neck to get a 
sight of Napoleon III. Those were the days 
in the history of Napoleon when he wanted to 
shine. I remember, one day when I was at the 
Exposition, there was the Prince Imperial, and 
I thought the people had all gone mad. They 

[95] 



THE SOUL WINNER 

shouted — and the noise was terrific — because 
the Prince Imperial had come in. Four years 
after that, Napoleon was hurled from his throne, 
and had to flee to England, where he died in 
exile; and a little coffin, a small coffin, held all of 
him who was once so great. They haven't been 
willing to let his body go back to France; and 
the Prince Imperial went to his death outside 
of France. The glory of this world is transient; 
and how soon it passed away! 

My dear friends, let us be wise and live forever. 
"He that winneth souls is wise." That is true 
wisdom. The man who makes this world bet- 
ter is going to live forever, and the man who 
lives a mean, selfish life — he may shine for a 
little while down here, but after all he is missing 
that which is sweet and beautiful, and he will 
soon be forgotten. The names of many men 
are forgot about as soon as they are laid in the 
grave. I would stir you up this day to go out 
into this dark world and win some one else. Oh, 
if you succeed in winning one soul, your life 
won't be a vain one! I want a monument. 
These monuments of brass and stone don't 
amount to anything. They will crumble. But 
if you win and save ten, a hundred, a thousand, 
ten thousand, see how the stream goes on 
deepening and widening forever! That is the 
privilege of every soul here today. 

[96] 



THE SOUL WINNER 

I remember when I was a young man I saw 
two pictures. One was of a person who was 
drowning; the person had come out of the water 
to a cross on a rock, to which the figure clung 
with both arms. The other was the picture of 
a person coming out of the water, out of the 
jaws of death, and reaching the arm down 
to get hold of some one else. The first picture 
I didn't want: it told of self; the other I liked, 
as it spoke of the rescue of a fellow being. 
There's a lot of that kind of religion. "Let the 
world go; I've got my arms around the Cross!" 
O man! If you are saved, haste to the rescue! 

I was up in Minnesota a few years ago, and 
this blizzard today reminds me of it. There 
was a man out there who got caught in one of 
those blizzards, and a blizzard out there is a 
blizzard! It rushes in from those great rolling 
prairies, where the wind comes from the north 
pole, and there's nothing to stop it. This man 
got lost in the storm, and he was just ready to 
sink down and die w^hen he saw a light in a log 
cabin. Some one had thought: "There may 
be one lost tonight who will need this"; and a 
light was placed in the cabin window. He got 
out of the storm, and since then he has become 
a wealthy man, and has bought a farm where 
that log cabin stood. He built another dwell- 
ing and put a light-house up on the top. In 

[97] 



THE SOUL WINNER 

this a lamp is kept burning every night in the 
hope that some lost one may see it and be guided 
to safety. I like that; don't you? Well, go 
and light up some wanderer in life's storm! If 
some one has told you the Way into the Kingdom 
of God, hasten to tell somebody else. Do you 
know how this world is to be saved? If you 
meet a man in trouble, take his hand and 
tell him how you found peace. Be a preacher! 
Instead of a few, we want a thousand. 

I used to have a rule that proved a wonderful 
help to me: it was never to let a day pass with- 
out speaking to somebody about his eternal wel- 
fare, and if I didn't do any good to anybody 
else, it kept me warm. It was a great exercise 
for me, and it kept my interest in others, my 
sympathies alive. 

I was living in Chicago. At ten o'clock one 
night I recalled that that day I hadn't said 
anything to anybody about the Kingdom of 
God. I walked out and met a man standing by 
a lamp-post. I said: "Are you a Christian?" 
The man in his anger was going to strike me. 
He told me it was none of my business. I 
wasn't aware that the man knew me, so I passed 
on. This man went to a friend of mine, a 
mutual friend, and said: "Do you know, that 
man Moody is doing more harm than any other 
man in Chicago is doing good? I was standing 

[98] 



THE SOUL WINNER 

up against a lamp-post, and he talked to me 
about my soul." My friend came to me and 
said: "You are too zealous. You do more 
harm than good. There's such a thing as 
having too much zeal." 

Have zeal, if it is good zeal. I would rather 
have zeal without knowledge than knowledge 
without zeal. Don't let these conservative men 
scare you out of your wits. Zeal without knowl- 
edge! I pity those men who have great knowl- 
edge and no fire back of it. If you've got your 
head full of knowledge, get up and go. Tell a 
man in this storm that you are going to talk 
to him about his soul. You couldn't have a 
better day. I am not out of my head by a 
good deal. I wasn't out of my head when I 
spoke to that man at ten o'clock at night. My 
friend labored with me; he thanked God he 
never followed me. But if you are going to 
take what this man says, or consider how that 
man feels, you'll never be great for the cause of 
Christ. Keep going ahead. Every day do a 
little something for the cause of God. 

Some one has described this world as being 
made up of two great mountains, the one a 
mountain of sorrow and wretchedness, and the 
other one of delight. If you can take a little 
off the mountain of sorrow and wretchedness, 
it enlarges the other. 

[99] 



THE SOUL WINNER 

Well, about three months from the day I 
have been telling you about — it was just before 
I was married — I was sleeping in the rooms of 
the Y. M. C. A. — I was sexton, janitor, su- 
perintendent, president, and director, all there 
was to it officially — one bleak winter morning 
I heard someone knocking at the door. I 
awoke and called out: "Who's there?" "A 
stranger." "What do you want?" "I want 
to talk with you about my soul." I opened the 
door, and there stood a man shaking all over. 
I imagined he had delirium tremens. I was 
after these drinking men, as Murphy is now. 
I didn't know but that he was drunk. He 
asked: "Do you remember stopping a man 
down on Lake street about ten o'clock one 
stormy night, and he got angry and cursed you? ' ' 
I told him I remembered that. "I am that 
man," he said, "and for three months I haven't 
had any peace. I have come to tell you that 
I want to know what to do to become a Chris- 
tian. Can't I do something for Christ?" He 
wanted to know how he might work for Christ. 
I asked him over to my own Sabbath School, 
and he went to work with a class of rough boys. 
That man as a Christian enlisted in the army 
and was cut down in battle. 

I believe there are hundreds of men who can 
be saved in Boston, thousands of them, if we 

[100] 



THE SOUL WINNER 

could get right at them. Don't wait! Take 
them in cold blood. I hear about my being 
over-zealous. I will talk to men on the street, 
nor wait to be introduced. People think you 
must get them out to special meetings, and have 
them rise up. I don't believe that many in 
this audience will have a better chance to do 
work in Boston than today. Why, everybody 
is talking about the question of Salvation. 
Some talking against the meetings, and some 
talking for them! Never mind the meetings. 
Go to them and tell them about seeking God. 
"They that be wise shall shine as the stars for- 
ever and ever." Would to God I could think 
of something that will stir you up, set you all 
on fire ! I like to see a man on fire, I must con- 
fess. I am not afraid of it. I like this holy 
fire. It is a good thing — do you know it — 
to catch fire. You've got to have fire to set fire 
with. You've got to have life to propagate life. 
I want fire. May God set us on fire, that we 
may illuminate this city. 

When I first went West and got into those 
log school houses, I was a drummer. I used to 
speak, if I got a chance, for Christ. On one 
occasion a man asked me: "Will you speak 
again this evening?" Then he added: "My 
young brother from Chicago is passing through 
our town, and he has promised to speak here 

[101] 



THE SOUL WINNER 

tonight, at early candle-light." That's the way 
he gave it out, you know. We always used to 
go around a little ahead of time, and a man 
would turn up with an old, dingy lantern he 
had to feed his cattle with, and he would stick 
it up on a bench to light the school house. I 
hadn't a light, but they brought their light. 
Then a woman would come with a lamp filled 
with sperm oil, and she would bring it out from 
under her shawl, and she would put it on a school 
bench, and then another a tallow dip, a candle, 
and how it would splutter! And by the time 
we got the old school house filled, we had plenty 
of light. If everybody had a little light, it 
would light it. That man up in the gallery 
says "Amen." I hope he has got his light lit. 
If you can't be a light-house, you can light up 
your tallow dip. They burned up Portland with 
a fire-cracker. Do what you can! 

I remember, speaking about "being on fire," 
the first time I went to Europe in '67. They 
said: "The Honorable G. H. Stuart is to be at 
Edinburgh at the General Assembly; Dr. Duff 
is to speak on foreign missions. If he makes 
a speech you can't afford to miss it." I got that 
speech. I went over from London to Edin- 
burgh, four hundred miles, and I didn't have 
much money either, but I spent one week there 
— because at that time the city was warm for 

[102] 



THE SOUL WINNER 

God. I hoped to be fired up. If you have a 
man that has fire, get near to him. In that 
speech in '67, Dr. Duff stood for one hour and a 
half and plead with the General Assembly of 
the Free Church of Scotland, made up of the 
leading ministers of that country, six or eight 
hundred men and the finest men in the land. 
For an hour and a half he plead for India, with 
all the power God gave him. He was trying to 
stir up Scotland, and at last he fainted away, 
and they carried him out into the vestibule, and 
they worked over him. When he came to he 
said: "Where am I?" They said, "In the 
Assembly Hall." : 'Yes, I remember. I was 
making a plea for India. Yes. I didn't quite 
finish my speech. Take me back, and let me 
finish my speech!" One said, "Dr. Duff, if you 
go back, you do it at the peril of your life. I 
beg you, let me take you home in my carriage." 
The Doctor said, "The General Assembly 
breaks up tonight, and it is my last opportunity. 
Take me back and let me finish my speech! 
I'll die if I don't." 

I like that kind of enthusiasm. I pray God 
to let me keep my enthusiasm until He takes me 
home. The Hon. George H. Stuart said, "Of 
all scenes, I never saw anything like that." 
Dr. Duff had a great, long beard and white hair, 
and he was so weak that he had to have two 

[103] 



THE SOUL WINNER 

men help him up on the platform, and when the 
Elders saw him, they rose and they raised a 
long plaudit, and were in tears, and the old 
veteran stood there and said: 

"Mr. Moderator! Is it true that Scotland has 
no more sons to give to India? When Queen 
Victoria wants men to go there, there are hun- 
dreds of men who want to go, are anxious to go, 
and parents buy commissions, and give money 
to get their sons into the army of India; and here 
is the Lord Jesus calling for volunteers, money 
in the bank and no men! Fathers and mothers 
say they don't want their sons exposed to the 
diseases of India, and are afraid they will lose 
them. Now, Mr. Moderator, if it is true that 
Scotland has no more sons to give to India, if 
you will announce it here tonight, and though 
I have come back in my old age to die with my 
family, and with a shattered constitution — if 
it is true that Scotland has no more sons, I will 
pack up tomorrow and be off to the shores of 
the Ganges and let the people of India know 
that there is one poor old Scotchman who is 
ready to die for them." 

That's what I call fire and enthusiasm. My 
friends, I would today that I could fire you up 
to go out and win people to Christ. What an 
opportunity you have! What a day this is for 
Boston! It is not often the breath of God 

[104] 



THE SOUL WINNER 

comes upon a city like Boston. People are 
thinking. Men in their bed-chambers are think- 
ing; they lie down at night and think, and get 
up in the morning and think; and now it is 
the time to point them to Jesus Christ. 

It is said of Napoleon I that after one of 
his great battles, he had some medals struck 
off giving an account of the battle on one side, 
and on the other side these words: "I was 
there." My friends, the battle of life will soon 
be over. The conflict here with many of us 
will soon be over, and it will be a great thing 
w T hen the struggle is over to say: "I was there." 
The old veterans would take out those medals 
and show them, and say, "I was there." 
Let us go into the holy battle; let us haste to 
the rescue, and let every one of us remember 
that "They that be wise shall shine as the sun 
in the firmament; and they that win many to 
righteousness, as the stars forever and ever." 
You can shine forever, if you will. 



[105] 



WORKING FOR CHRIST* 

"Which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted? and they 
have slain them which showed before the coming of the Just 
One, of whom ye have been now the betrayers and murderers.' 9 
Acts vii. 52. 

THERE are ten addresses in the Book of Acts. 
First, Peter preached on the Day of Pente- 
cost; then in the Temple, the time the man 
was healed and five thousand converted. The 
next, when Peter and John were arrested and 
brought before the Sanhedrin, and Peter said, 
"There's no other Name given under heaven 
whereby ye must be saved." Fourth, when all 
the apostles were arrested and brought before 
the same Council. The Sanhedrin had given 
them instructions not to preach any more in His 
Name; but they have gone out and continued to 
preach in His Name. They were brought before 
the Council. See the twenty-eighth verse of the 
Fifth Chapter. "Did not we strictly command 
you that you should not teach in this name, and 
behold ye have filled Jerusalem with your 
doctrines." 

Now it was but a few days since Christ had 
ascended to glory, and these very men, men that 

* Delivered in Tremont Temple, February 2, 1898. 

[106] 



WORKING FOR CHRIST 

hadn't any reputation, men without note, and 
without titles to their names, unlettered men, 
had filled all Jerusalem with their doctrines. It 
shows what can be brought about when men 
begin to testify for God, and speak out. "Then 
Peter and the other apostles answered and said, 
We ought to obey God rather than you." Now, 
there is a mighty principle told right there. 
When the laws of man conflict with the law of 
God, we have no choice; we are to go against the 
laws of man. If these great corporations insist 
upon making laws that we are to do unnecessary 
work on the Sabbath, we are to oppose them, and 
fight to the bitter end. What we want is men, 
men that stem the current of an ungodly world. 

Any man or any woman can go with the world. 
We need men who can oppose the world if need 
be. "The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, 
whom ye slew and hanged on a tree." It made 
no difference where they went, or what their 
opposition — they always brought in the fact 
that Christ died. They were going to get the 
Gospel before the Council, and her chief men in 
Jerusalem were to hear the fact that Jesus Christ 
was the God of Glory, "Him hath God exalted 
with His right hand to be a Prince and a 
Saviour." 

LISTEN! "And we are his witnesses." There 
it is again, and every time they are arrested 

[107] 



WORKING FOR CHRIST 

they bring in the fact that they are witnesses for 
Christ. They don't say, " We are his preachers/ 5 
or orators, but "we are His witnesses, and stand 
to testify that Christ died and rose again, and 
has gone up on high." 

Some one tells us that it is not the Death of 
Christ — they preach his Death, Resurrection 
and Ascension, and they lay emphasis upon the 
latter. In the days of the Exodus, God didn't 
say to Moses, "Tie a live lamb upon the door- 
posts." He said, "When I see the blood, I will 
pass over." It was Death that made the Israel- 
ites safe away back there in Goshen. Every 
man having the blood on his door lintels was as 
safe as if he walked the heavenly streets. The 
innocent suffer for the guilty. The lamb that 
was slain, away back there in Abel's day, was to 
atone for sin. That's the teaching of Scripture. 
"We are witnesses of these things." 

You very often hear people pray that they may 
have power, Holy Ghost power, and keep on 
praying. There are some people I have heard 
who prayed and were not answered. Why? 
It's because they were not willing to obey the 
Holy Ghost. If a man is willing to confess his 
sins and turn from them, and go right out and 
set to work, God is willing to meet him. You 
remember when Elijah was called up, Elisha 
wanted to receive a double portion of the Spirit, 

[108] 



WORKING FOR CHRIST 

and he got a double portion of the Spirit. He 
didn't say, "I wish I had it. He promised it, 
but I don't know if the promise is to be fulfilled." 
When he got to Jordan he smote it. He went out 
by faith on the promise, If we confess our sins, 
God is faithful, just, to cleanse us from our sins. 
Now if you have attained that blessing, go right 
to work for God. You will be blessed in the 
work. I don't believe you can go anywhere and 
fold your arms and say, "I hope God will fill me 
with His Spirit, and endue me with power." 
You'll never get the power till you rise and work 
for it. 

I am back here to stir you up, and to get you 
to go to work, and you'll be blest in the very 
effort of doing something for others, for some- 
body else. If you want your captivity turned 
to freedom, go to work. Power is for service. 
Then begin right off, and go to work. There's 
work for all. There's no difficulty. I don't 
care what your difference is in position. The 
proud may look down on you, and sneer. Never 
mind. 

Another famous sermon. That's the longest 
in the whole book and preached, not by a man 
that had a title to his name, but just an ordinary 
church-member, a deacon. There was much 
time taken up looking after the temporal things 
by the apostles, and they said, "We must have 

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WORKING FOR CHRIST 

some deacons, full of faith and the Holy Ghost." 
It would be a nice thing to pick out a man full 
of faith and the Holy Ghost; not because he 
has money, or political power, or because he's 
got some influence that perhaps is not of the 
very best kind, or has the very best kind of 
influence, if he's put into office. Would to God 
we could keep close to Him, and could elect men 
full of faith and of the Holy Ghost! Get a 
minister full of faith and of the Holy Ghost, and 
a Board of like character, and that church, 
wherever it is, will be a great beacon light. 
But if you have a minister full of faith and the 
Holy Ghost, and a lot of elders playing cards, 
and horse-racing, you haven't much power. 

This world is in revolt against God, and you 
must bring it back. And you could if men 
were full of the Holy Ghost. Now, the apostles 
selected some deacons of that kind. They found 
a young man, and his name was Deacon Stephen. 
He began to preach, and with so much power 
that the whole city was moved by him. I wish 
we could get back to that. There are those who 
cannot be reached by the faith of the ministers. 

When our War broke out, we had a little 
handful of about twenty-five thousand regular 
soldiers. What was that to put down the Con- 
federacy? We had to call out volunteers, and 
with the regulars they put down the Confed- 

[110] 



WORKING FOR CHRIST 

eracy. And what we want today is the regular, 
ordinary ministers and also the laymen working 
together. Just now we want a thousand Steph- 
ens. Do you know, I don't believe our cities are 
going to be evangelized until we have laymen in 
to work. Let them preach! Somebody will 
complain because they haven't been ordained, 
and haven't "Reverend" attached to their 
names. "Reverend and Holy shall be called the 
name of God." Let them go on without the 
Reverend; go on without D.D. and LL.D., and 
do the work. All we ask is that they shall 
have the gift, the heart to reach the common 
people. There are the masses, more than forty 
million of people in this country who don't go 
to church. How shall they be reached? Let 
us get some more Stephens. 

In the old country a man said he hadn't 
"Orders." Orders from whom? I'm not going 
to have a man lay hands on me who can't control 
his temper. But when a man is full of faith 
and of the Holy Ghost, let them lay hands on 
him as they did on Stephen. How did this lay- 
man preach? He began with, "Brethren and 
Fathers." He then talked about Abraham and 
about Moses, and he came along down the 
straight, clear way; there's not a boy in Sunday 
School but could have done as Stephen did. It 
was like a Sunday School scholar to tell the 

[in] 



WORKING FOR CHRIST 

history of Israel. The people listened. "The 
God of our fathers." And Stephen talked of 
Abraham and Moses and of the prophets; and 
when he got along towards their own days, he 
began to talk about their crucifying Christ; 
then they began to squirm. You can stand up 
before an audience like this, and talk about 
Abraham and the failings of the patriarchs, and 
they like it; and they like to have a man march- 
ing up and down the country talking about "The 
Mistakes of Moses, " but when you talk about 
their mistakes, they get mad, and when you talk 
about the sins of the present day, they don't 
like it. 

A young man took a church in Scotland, 
where there had been an old minister for fifty 
years. That church had gone to sleep. This 
young man began to speak of modern sins and 
the "old bottle." And they took him to one 
side, and said: "If you expect to hold this posi- 
tion, and please this congregation, you must be 
very careful not to bear down upon their sins. 
Don't go any nearer than the olden days." 
They'll stand it pretty well if you hit somebody 
else, as you stand it well if I hit somebody else; 
but if I hit you, you want to go. Herod liked 
John the Baptist's preaching first rate. If you 
had met Herod in those days, you would have 
heard him say : " I don't like the man any better 

[112] 



WORKING FOR CHRIST 

than I did." And when John said to Herod, 
"It is not lawful for you to have your brother's 
wife/' he didn't like it. "I'll never go to hear 
that man again. He's too personal." Well, 
it wasn't long before he took John's head off. 
It's true today as in Herod's time. I can get 
people so mad they'll walk out. Last Sun- 
day I was in Ohio, and I talked about men 
renting their houses for vile uses. I said to a 
man, about another, "What's the matter with 
that man? Why is he in that business?" The 
man I addressed got up and went out. If 
some of you get up and go out, we shall know 
what it means. These men didn't go out, but 
Stephen got down to them, and when he talked 
about murdering Christ, they began to gnash 
their teeth. Stephen had a shining face, and 
for eighteen hundred years he has been known as 
"the man with the shining face." Don't go 
about with a frown or a snarl, but with a face 
illuminated with the light of Heaven. God's 
service is not tedious or hard; it is a joy 
and delight to do His bidding and to work for 
Him. 

Stephen had a shining face, standing there 
and bearing down on the sins of the Sanhedrin. 
It was a good sermon, that preached by Stephen, 
it was perfectly Scriptural. It would be a good 
thing, if a speaker is to preach a good sermon, 

[113] 



WORKING FOR CHRIST 

to preach one of the sermons preached back in 
that olden time. 

The fifty-second verse. " Which of the proph- 
ets have not your fathers persecuted? and they 
have slain them which showed before of the 
coming of the Just One, of whom ye have been 
now the betrayers and murderers. " 

If you asked who the great men were in the 
days of Noah, the answer wouldn't be "Noah. 55 
He wasn't anybody when he lived. You ask in 
the days of Moses who the great men were; 
the answer would be Abraham, Noah, and Enoch, 
somebody in the past. Coming along down, 
and asking who in the days of Elijah was great; 
was it Elijah? Not at all, it would have been 
Moses and Aaron. And in the days of John 
the Baptist it would have been Elijah and Moses 
and those that have passed. But after a man 
has been dead awhile the world begins to appre- 
ciate him. Tradition has it that Isaiah while 
alive was sawed asunder. Some of the best 
men were put to death because the light where 
they stood was so strong that it blinded the men 
in the world. "And they have slain them which 
showed before of the coming of the Just One, of 
whom ye have been now the betrayers and mur- 
derers: who have received the law by the dis- 
position of angels, and have not kept it. 
When they heard these things, they were cut 

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WORKING FOR CHRIST 

to the heart, and they gnashed on him with 
their teeth. But he, being full of the Holy 
Ghost, looked up steadfastly into heaven, and 
saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on 
the right hand of God. And said, Behold, I 
see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man 
standing at the right hand of God." 

You remember wlien Christ went up, he took 
his seat at the right hand of God, and here was 
the first martyr laying down his life for the Son 
of God, and he "saw Christ standing at the right 
hand of God." We only get one glimpse of 
him. He was elected deacon, and he went 
right to work. And see how much he accom- 
plished! It's not the length of life, but how 
you spend it. Methuselah lived a thousand 
years, and we don't know that he did anything 
worth wiiile. Look at Stephen — one sermon, 
and how it has been preached and talked about 
for centuries, and will be talked about as long 
as the Church is to be on earth. And how much 
is it thought of in the years past; how much 
will be thought of it in the centuries to come. 

Do you know that I firmly believe that we 
have in Boston a thousand men that can preach 
as well as could Stephen? There are hundreds 
in Tremont Temple today who, if filled with the 
Holy Ghost, could go out and preach as well as 
Stephen. As I said before, I don't believe 

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WORKING FOR CHRIST 

these great cities will be evangelized until the 
laymen take up the work of the ministry. Now, 
here are the theaters, and the music halls, and 
the larger halls, why should they not be opened 
Sunday after Sunday, and filled by laymen 
speakers? Look at a judge who sits on the bench 
and charges a jury, and who pronounces sentence 
on the prisoner. If that same judge would 
preach now and then, and try to save men from 
going astray, wouldn't it be a good thing? We 
should have a lot of Christian judges in America, 
if they were but filled with the Holy Ghost. 
Did you ever go into court and hear the lawyer 
carry the court with him? Many of them are 
Christian men. Now, suppose they should 
preach; how much would be accomplished, if 
we could get a Christian lawyer to be a witness 
for the Son of God. How many merchants 
there are here in Boston who would have influ- 
ence if they preached to the masses. Some of 
you smile. I think it's the most practical thing 
in the world. I don't see how we are going to 
evangelize these cities unless this is done. 

In Liverpool, I went to the largest hall, and 
I found the speaker was an intellectual broker. 
He preached twice every Sunday. Many were 
under conviction and many were converted. 
When that man died, he had one of the largest 
churches in Liverpool, and thousands on thou- 

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WORKING FOR CHRIST 

sands of the men in Great Britain were converted 
under his ministry. He worked every Sabbath, 
and one night in the week he devoted to that 
kind of work. Then there was another great 
building that seated five thousand people, and 
a layman spoke to five thousand people, and 
they were converted by hundreds all around him, 
and an immense amount of good was done. I 
went to Manchester, and the largest hall was 
packed twice every Sabbath by another broker 
preacher. In London, I found men of the 
nobility preaching in the theaters, and men were 
being convinced and converted. I believe that 
the theaters will yet be opened on the Sabbath, 
and in a way that will win the people. I want 
some Stephens to step out now and press for- 
ward. Let a judge speak, and some will say: 
"I don't think that's professional." Thank 
God, some are stirring men now, and they work 
for us, and for those men who can't work for 
themselves. There's one lady in New York 
City who has thirteen missionaries working to 
evangelize that city. It is not only the Stephens, 
but you men, but you women, every one of you, 
who can work if you will. The field is open now 
to any man or woman who has a heart for the 
work. God can use them. 

There was a Quaker lady who came into our 
meetings in 1873, in the north of England, and 

[117] 



WORKING FOR CHRIST 

God touched her heart and opened her eyes, and 
she hired a great big hall at her own expense, 
and sent to London and Liverpool and Man- 
chester for workers, and entertained them and 
fed them. She has done it since 1873. I met 
her son in Minneapolis, and I asked him if his 
mother was keeping up that work. "Doubt- 
less," said he. Three thousand working men 
were reached by that Quaker lady, and hundreds 
and thousands were rescued by that woman's 
doing something for the Master. I remember 
in Birmingham there was a meeting like this, 
and a lady sat there, who said: "Well, now, I 
don't see why I can't do something. I have 
means and I've no family, nor family ties, so I 
can't see why I shouldn't be worth something 
to somebody." She took a house; then she 
hunted up her fallen sisters, and told them if 
they would come around to her house — she didn't 
call it a Place of Refuge — she would be very glad 
to help them in any way she could. When they 
came, she made the place as cheerful and cozy 
as possible. She had pleasant readings for them; 
she had a sewing machine, everything indeed to 
take their minds off of their past lives. That 
woman rescued four hundred of these fallen 
sisters who were going to ruin, and she made 
such an impression upon that town that when 
she died, the Mayor and the Council said, "This 

[118] 



WORKING FOR CHRIST 

work must not stop"; and they've kept that 
work up ever since. That's one woman ! 

When we think of Stephen and what one man 
accomplished, we come here and pray God for 
the Holy Ghost. Let us go out for work. 
There's not a man or woman here, not one, that 
loves Jesus Christ, if the record is clean and the 
heart's all right, but can do good work. If you 
can't open a hall, go out on the streets. When 
I was in Edinburgh, they told me that one of the 
worst places was in Cow Court, one of the dark- 
est streets of Edinburgh. But, rain or shine, 
Sundays and cloudy days, every night right 
along for twenty-nine years, there has been a 
religious meeting there. One man took it on 
Monday, and another on Tuesday, and another 
on Wednesday, and so on through the week. 
I like the Scotch grit; there's no cessation in 
the meetings. Just at a quarter to eight a man 
came and backed himself up against a lamp-post. 
In a few minutes he had a crowd; and then they 
marched up to the building — it was a miserable 
looking building. I had the pleasure of trying 
to get the people of Edinburgh to put him up a 
good building; but without this they have had 
a meeting right along every Sunday for between 
thirty and forty years. Some of the finest men 
today in Scotland who are standing for the Son 
of God were converted at Cow Gate near to 

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WORKING FOR CHRIST 

that lamp-post. There are many of these lay- 
men, not only willing to go there nights, but at 
other times. Lord Overton, of Scotland, is one 
of the best lay-speakers, a man of position and 
wealth, and there isn't a week passes that he is 
not speaking in some part of the United King- 
dom. Not only in Glasgow, but all through 
Scotland and England that man's influence is 
felt. And so it can be today if the Christian 
men and women will rise up and say: "I'll not 
wait any longer for any Christian committee to 
put me to work!" Oh, the power that's in this 
hall today! You can be a Stephen, if you will. 
You can speak as well as Stephen did, if you have 
the Spirit. That's what we want. Somebody 
who can stand and testify for Christ. 

You notice that Stephen had a shining face. 
They accused him of blaspheming Moses. The 
late Dr. Andrew Bonar, in Northfield, said, 
"I've noticed that the moment they accused 
Stephen of blasphemy, he had that same shining 
face that Moses had." Another thing about 
Moses and Stephen is this: Everything about 
Moses — his birth and life — is put forth like 
a panorama; but when it comes to his death, 
no man was a witness to that. It is all covered 
up. But Stephen — we don't know where he 
was born, or who his parents were, or where they 
lived, but we know he preached one sermon, 

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WORKING FOR CHRIST 

and there is an accurate account of his falling 
asleep and being borne away by the weeping 
church, and that there were great lamentations 
over him. There's no funeral recorded that has 
been so much spoken of as that of this man — 
the man who lived so near heaven that he looked 
in, and saw the Son of Man standing by the seat 
of God. 

Now, I must go on to the next sermon. It 
is the last Peter ever preached; it is to the 
Gentiles. Peter was the instrument of unlock- 
ing the door to let the Gentiles in. Ten years 
have passed. There's a meeting at Cesarea; 
a Roman soldier has been brought under 
conviction, and they send off thirty miles to 
Joppa, to get a man to tell him what to do. Do 
you want to know how to preach? Go and 
read that sermon carefully and see what Peter 
preached to that Roman soldier. He preached 
to that Gentile as he did to the Jews. Some 
people have an idea that you must have a differ- 
ent Gospel for different nations. It's the same 
old Gospel and the same power. I'll read one 
or two verses. "We are witnesses of all things 
which he did both in the land of the Jews, and 
in Jerusalem, whom they slew and hanged on a 
tree. Him God raised up the third day, and 
showed him openly: not to all the people but 
unto witnesses chosen before of God, even to us, 

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WORKING FOR CHRIST 

who did eat and drink with him after he rose 
from the dead. And he commanded us to 
preach unto the people, and to testify that it is 
he which was ordained of God to be the Judge 
of quick and dead. To him give all the prophets 
witness, that through his name whosoever believ- 
eth in him shall receive remission of sins." 

And God, without one minute's delay, put 
His seal to that testimony, and every one in 
that house was convicted and converted, and 
was baptized right then and there. Salvation 
came and swept them all into the Kingdom of 
God. "We are witnesses that Christ died, 
and rose for our justification, and sits at the 
right hand of God." They didn't change the 
Gospel every time they changed the audience, 
or because they were going to preach to the 
Gentiles. They preached the simple Gospel, 
and God put His seal to it and God blessed 
it. "And," he says, "the Holy Ghost fell on 
them as on us at the beginning" — the same 
results in Cesarea when he preached to the 
Gentiles as in Jerusalem when he preached to 
the Jews. 

Now, is there a man in this hall who can 
speak, that cannot preach the same sermon that 
Peter preached? Let us get a few women to- 
gether, and have a service and a Bible reading, 
and tell them this very truth, and see if God 

[122] 



WORKING FOR CHRIST 

won't bless your testimony. I believe if we had 
our homes, our little halls, and our churches open 
every night, that we should see a wonderful 
change in these cities; and I don't believe we 
are going to see it until we do. It is an abomi- 
nable thing to see our churches open but twice 
in the week, and all the brothels open all the 
time. Now it is one thing for you to say "Amen" 
here, and another to get up and change it. 
You know I believe in the one man power. A 
committee is a good thing. A committee at 
your back is a good thing, a mighty good thing; 
but a committee behind your back is bad. 

Now, we come to another sermon, the sermon 
of Paul. Paul was another witness. How did 
he preach? The Thirteenth Chapter of the Acts, 
twenty-ninth verse. " And when they had fulfilled 
all that was written of him, they took him down 
from the tree, and laid him in a sepulchre. But 
God raised him from the dead." The leaders 
change, but we have the same old Gospel. 
"And he was seen of them many days which 
came up with him from Galilee to Jerusalem, 
who are his witnesses unto the people." He 
could not say "We," but "Who" are His wit- 
nesses. But he took their testimony, "And we 
declare unto you glad tidings, how that the 
promise which was made unto the fathers, God 
hath fulfilled the same unto us their children, in 

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WORKING FOR CHRIST 

that he hath raised up Jesus again, as it is 
also written in the second psalm, Thou art my 
Son, this day have I begotten thee." 

Do you know what kind of effect that had? 
"Be it known unto you, men and brethren, that 
through this man is preached unto you the 
forgiveness of sins; and by him all that believe 
are justified from all things, from which ye could 
not be justified by the law of Moses. " 

Now go down to the forty -fourth verse. "And 
the next Sabbath day came almost the whole city 
together to hear the word of God." It stirred 
that tow^n up, didn't it? What's the preaching? 
The same old Gospel that Peter preached. He 
didn't change one bit. That's a fact. I've 
not seen a man in any part of Christendom who 
doesn't have reserve power in his ministry. 
Drunkards straightened, gamblers giving up 
their accursed business, the depraved turning 
from their bad lives and becoming pure. 

Why, do you know, they are trying in this 
day to do away with miracles; and one of the 
German philosophers has made the statement 
that if you can get rid of the resurrection of the 
dead and the conversion of Paul, they can sweep 
all the miracles out of the New Testament. 
One of them has made a discovery — he has 
got over the conversion of Paul. Paul had a 
sunstroke. Dr. Schauffier says, if a sunstroke 

[124] 



WORKING FOR CHRIST 

can do such a good thing as that, it would be a 
good thing to put the theological speakers out 
in the sun! Paul had a sunstroke! Would to 
God all had one — reporters and all ! There'd 
be a difference, I know, a difference in what 
follows. 

That man Paul was a persecutor; that man 
hated Christ and Christians. But when the 
Holy Ghost came upon him, he preached the 
same truths Peter did. It would be the same 
thing now. That's what we want — the Holy 
Ghost. Men and women; you, young men, 
you wouldn't be worth a snap, if you are not 
filled with the Spirit. You won't be worth 
as much as a piece of brown paper if you 
are not filled with the Holy Ghost. Paul had 
the very best training, but what was he good 
for until the Holy Ghost came upon him? 
When the Spirit came upon him, he turned 
Antioch upside down. That's the kind of a 
man we want now; a man to turn this city 
rightside up tomorrow. 

Now, friends, I am talking facts, and you know 
they are facts. You know of men who have 
fished all night and caught nothing, because 
they didn't cast the net on the right side of the 
ship. I know of men who preached against me 
twenty-five years ago. Where are they now? 
Go and hunt them up! I'd like to have you 

[125] 



WORKING FOR CHRIST 

find them. You don't get afraid when you 
take the man — Jesus Christ. No man with 
the Holy Ghost has ever failed; I'll challenge 
you to find a Heaven-sent man that ever failed. 
When God sends a man there's no failure. 



[126] 



TRUST* 

"Leave thy fatherless children, I will 'preserve them alive: and 
let thy widows trust in me." Jeremiah xlix. 11. 

YOU will find the word "Trust" is used in 
the Old Testament as a general thing 
where the word "Believe" is used in the 
New Testament. In the Old Testament you 
read about "turning to the Lord"; in the New 
Testament it is "repent." In the Old Testa- 
ment "distrust," in the New "disbelief." 

I find a great many people who say: "Well, 
I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God; 
and yet I don't think I am saved. I don't 
have any assurance. I don't have any peace 
in believing. I don't get victory over sin." 
So, to them I want to use the word "trust." 
And the six points to which I want to call 
your attention are these: 1. Whom not to trust. 
2. Whom to trust. 3. When to trust. 4. How 
to trust. 5. Who will trust. 6. The fruit of 
trust. 

Now, take up the first point: Whom not to 
trust. If we trust anything human, we are 
going to be disappointed. Paul says, "We 

♦Delivered in Tremont Temple, Boston. Mass., Feb. 10, 1897, p.m. 

[127] 



TRUST 

have the sentence of death in ourselves." If 
we trust in ourselves, the time is coming when 
our own strength is going to fail us, and we shall 
be disappointed. If we trust in friends, they 
may die and leave us, or they may turn against 
us. Many persons in this hall call to mind 
friends who were very dear to them years ago, 
whose friendship has ceased. You were dis- 
appointed in them; they betrayed your confi- 
dence. They were not what you thought them. 
If we trust in wealth, it may take wings and 
fly away. Many a man has been disappointed 
who has put his confidence in his money. A 
man told me some time ago that he had a good 
bank account, and had rather have that than 
faith in the Scriptures. I'd rather have it in 
Jesus Christ than in any bank. If you trust 
in fame and reputation, some slandering tongue 
may blast them. In fact, you want to put 
your trust in something beyond this world, 
something beyond this life. Now put your 
confidence in one who has never betrayed a con- 
fidence in six thousand years; who has never 
betrayed a trust in all these centuries, never has 
and never will. He cannot break one of His 
promises. He has said it. Shall He not make 
it good? The God of that Book is an un- 
changeable God, and if we put our trust in 
Him, we shall not be confounded nor disap- 

[128] 



TRUST 

pointed. When Christ was on earth He said: 
"Have faith in God." That is worth more 
than a shipload of gold. Strong faith in the 
mighty God who never has and never will and 
never can disappoint any. 

Some seem to think it is unreasonable. My 
dear friend, I think it is the most reasonable 
thing in this world that we should put our con- 
fidence in the God of that Book. A man said 
to me: "How can you promise that the promises 
are good and valuable?" I answered: "They 
are fulfilled every day, right along." Suppose 
a man had said to me forty years ago that on 
the first day of January he would give me a 
thousand dollars each year for forty years, and 
thirty years have passed away, and he has given 
me a thousand dollars every year; would I not 
have a pretty good reason to believe that the 
man is fulfilling his promises, and that he will 
continue so to do? As you go along day after 
day, how long do you doubt? I think I can 
doubt my existence about as easy as I can doubt 
God. It's not a hard thing to put your trust 
in Him. 

Well, now, that's the starting — Whom Not 
to Trust. Then, Whom to Trust. Then, 
When to Trust. We are to trust Him at all 
times. We are to trust at night as well as by 
day. We are to trust when we cannot see how 

[129] 



TRUST 

it is coming out, as well as when we can. There's 
a common saying, "I wouldn't trust that man 
out of my sight." That's the way a great 
many people treat the Almighty God. They 
don't say that in words; but they trust God as 
far as they can see, and no further. You have 
heard of the woman whose horse ran away with 
her. She was asked, "What did you do?" 
She trusted in the harness until it broke: then 
she trusted the wagon till it smashed. At 
last she called to God, and was saved. 

A person said to me: "Your doctrine is 
unreasonable. How can a sensible and reason- 
ing man believe when he can't see how it is 
coming out?" He can't see the end, my dear 
friend, but we are trusting all the time, and 
constantly. You put confidence in the bank. 
You don't know whether that bank will fail or 
not. Yet you trust in the bank. Isn't that 
trusting? What do you know about banking 
business? I don't know anything about it. 
Yet I would rather have my money there than 
in my pocket; it's a great deal safer there 
than with me. 

A mother has a child very sick — her only 
son — who has the scarlet fever; the mother 
is greatly distressed and broken down at the 
thought that her dear child is in a dangerous 
condition. What did that mother do? She 

[130] 



TRUST 

put the child in the care of the nurse and the 
doctor; then she left it and came down here to 
get sympathy; to have us pray that God would 
lengthen the life of that dear child. She didn't 
know about medicine, but she trusts the life 
of the child in the hands of the doctor. That's 
trusting when we can't see, isn't it, even when 
you can't reason the thing out? Or, here is a 
man to whom you owe an amount, and he sues 
you. You don't know about Blackstone or 
law, but you put your case in the hands of a 
lawyer. You commit the whole thing to him. 
That's trusting in the dark, when you can't see 
how it's coming out, and when you can't reason 
the whole thing out. 

Now trust. Put your soul in the hands of 
God, and trust Him to keep it and to do what 
He has promised to do. He has promised to 
forgive you, if you turn from your sins. If 
you are willing to turn, He forgives you now. 
Believe that He means you, and trust Him to 
do what He promises. Love begins right there. 
I want to say that you'll never find a better 
time, a better day, than now, this very hour. 
Some of you challenge that statement, and say: 
"If I can break up my bad habits, I can get 
victory over a bad disposition and get a better 
disposition." Everything is recorded against us. 
If you could go on from this day and not add 

[131] 



TRUST 

another sin but the one sin of procrastina- 
tion — that is the sin you are committing — you 
would still be in sin. You can never trust God 
better than now. Right here in Tremont Tem- 
ple let everlasting life begin in your soul, and 
put your trust in the Eternal God. 

There's a story of a man in the current of a 
river. He had been capsized and was being 
swept on. There were three bridges across the 
stream; if he passed the third bridge it was 
sure death to him. They rushed to the first 
bridge and threw over ropes; but he passed the 
first bridge and didn't lay hold of the ropes; 
then the second, and didn't lay hold of the rope. 
He came to the third bridge, that was his last 
opportunity. But just as he was passing the 
last rope, he happened to seize it, and he was 
pulled up out of the jaws of death. I am speak- 
ing to some one who is passing the last bridge. 
It may be that God is calling you the last time, 
but now put your trust in Him. Lay hold 
on eternal life while it's offered you. Make up 
your mind that this day and hour you are going 
to put your trust in God. 

Take another illustration: a building is on 
fire. The flames have got around the staircase, 
and the only way of escape must be from out- 
side. There's a person up there in the fifth 
story. There's no escape unless God helps. 

[132] 



TRUST 

But there's the fire escape, and we put it up to 
the window, and all that person has to do is to 
commit himself to the fire escape, and trust, 
and escape. Today, this hour, you must trust 
Him. Now is the time. When? NOW! This 
minute, and you can do it while I'm speaking, 
if you will. 

I come to the next point: How to Trust Him. 
My friend, I have said before on this platform, 
and you'll let me repeat, I believe we are in the 
days of shams and half -hear tedness. How seek 
Him? The Bible tells us to "seek Him with 
all the heart." I never see a man or woman 
seeking the Kingdom of God with all his or her 
heart who doesn't get into it. You can trust. 
Will you do it? When I was in Glasgow, one 
of the physicians of that city who stood very 
high, and who was at the head of the medical 
profession of that country, and getting on in 
years, came up to the platform one day, and said: 
"I'm not used to speaking in public, but I'd 
like to say a word." "Glad to have you." 
That man was living on borrowed time. He 
stood up, and there was a hush, and as it were 
a voice coming from heaven, from another 
world. He said: "I want to tell you of a great 
mistake made in my life. If I had my life to 
live over again, I wouldn't make it. I haven't 
served God with all my heart." There weren't 

[133] 



TRUST 

any dry eyes there. I shall never forget that 
speech. man, woman, trust Him with all 
your heart! How miserable you wives feel if 
you haven't full confidence in your husbands; 
or if your husbands don't trust you with all 
their hearts. And how the husband feels if the 
wife don't trust him with all her heart. What 
God wants is the whole heart. It is for us to 
trust Him with all our hearts. 

There's a story told that Alexander the Great 
had a favorite doctor who always went with him 
into all his battles. This doctor had another 
doctor envious of him, who wanted to get his 
position. One day he wrote to Alexander, and 
told him that that physician was going to poison 
him; that the next morning when he took his 
wine, there would be death in the goblet. The 
emperor read the communication to himself, 
and the next morning, when the doctor handed 
him the wine glass, he took it and held it in his 
hand, and then read the letter, and before the 
doctor could deny, he drank it down, to show 
that he trusted him in all his heart, and there 
was not a shadow of doubt. Is that the way 
you treat God? If you trust God in that way, 
you'll have no cloud, no dark days, no blue days, 
but it'll be better and better every day. I hope 
you do this all the time. I pity those people 
who live in Doubting Castle. Man, woman, 

[134] 



TRUST 

get out of it! Don't say you'll try. TRUST! 
I've heard people say, "Mr. Moody, I'm going 
to try all I can." That means you are not 
trying. If I say to my friend here that I will 
meet you tomorrow morning at nine o'clock, 
and he replied: "I'll try hard to believe you," 
it would prove that he is not trusting me. When 
a man says "I'm trying," or "I'll try," blot 
that out. Say: "I'll trust Him with all my 
heart, whether I feel like it or not." 

There's a story told of Dr. Chalmers, that he 
was up in the Highlands. Those people have 
a peculiar kind of theology. Some one asked 
a boy up there what Faith was, and he said, 
"Inward fears and doubts." There was a 
Highland woman who was "full of fears and 
doubts." They wanted Dr. Chalmers to come 
and help her. There was a brook, and a plank 
across the brook. Dr. Chalmers was afraid 
the plank was rotten and would let him into the 
stream. He tried it to see how it would work; 
still he was a little afraid tc commit himself to 
the plank. The Highland woman saw it, and 
coming out said, " Tilt it." That meant " trust " 
it. The Doctor took her at her word, and reach- 
ing her tried to talk with her. She couldn't 
understand the Plan of Salvation. He went on 
trying to clear up the way, but without success 
till he happened to think of the plank, and he 

[135] 



TRUST 

found his way to her heart. I see some of the 
Scotch people whispering, and I fear I've not 
got the story just straight. But the Doctor 
said "Trust! Just as I committed myself to 
that plank, commit yourself to Christ, and trust 
Him, and He will be your Saviour." Of course, 
she could do that and so can you. That's the 
question for you to settle. I can't trust for you; 
I can't believe for you. But you can now trust 
Him with your heart. Say, as Job did, " Though 
he slay me, I'll perish trusting." There's not 
a soul that cannot do that now. 

The next Head. Who will Trust? When 
to trust. Whom to trust. And now, Who will 
trust. They that know Him. You ask me to 
put my confidence in a man down there I've 
never seen before. I can't do it. I must hear 
about him, know something about him, I must 
get witnesses concerning him. Why is it infidels 
don't trust in God? They don't know Him. 
That's the reason they don't trust Him. If 
you'll find a man or woman that reads that 
Bible, and studies the promises, you'll find a 
man or woman that believes in God. They 
can't help it. It is those men or women that 
neglect their Bible and don't read about God 
that don't trust Him. Job says, "Acquaint 
now thyself with Him, and be at peace." Get 
more acquainted with the God of Heaven and 

[136] 



TRUST 

you'll trust Him more. The more you know 
of a true man, the more confidence you put in 
him. The more you know of an untrue man, 
the less faith you have in him. You understand 
that, don't you? Now in the Ninth Psalm, 
tenth verse, are these words: "And they that 
know Thy name will put their trust in Thee: 
for Thou, Lord, hast not forsaken them that 
seek Thee." Never forsaken them that seek 
Him. And now, will you put your confidence 
in Him? Will you get acquainted with Him? 
You can. Make it your life business to know 
the God of that Book. 

There's a story told of some men in Scotland 
who made it a business to get a certain kind of 
eggs, and they made considerable money. They 
tried to get a man into a bag and lower over the 
cliff. They would pay him a good deal of money, 
and he needed the money. He declined to do 
it. They told him, "We are strong, and we'll 
hold the rope." The man replied, "If you'll 
wait until I go and get my father, I'll let him 
hold the rope, and I'll go down in the basket." 
They said, "We are stronger than your father." 
"Yes," he answered, "but I don't know you." 
He knew that his father wouldn't let go of the 
rope. He could trust his father, but these 
strangers he could not trust. This is the trouble 
with the people here in Boston. They don't 

[137] 



TRUST 

come to God and get acquainted with Him, and 
so don't love and trust Him. 

Now, I come to the last point. The Fruit 
of Trust. It is luscious fruit. "Thou wilt keep 
him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed 
on Thee, because he trusteth in Thee." You 
know the world is after peace; that's the cry 
of the world. That is what the world wants. 
Probe the human heart, and you'll find down 
in its depths a want, a cry for rest. Where can 
rest be found? Here it is, right here. Put your 
trust in the living God, with all your heart, 
mind, soul, and strength, and you'll have peace. 
Don't think to keep it; it keeps you. There 
are lots of people trying to keep peace; it's 
better to have peace keep you. There is a place 
within reach where you may have perfect peace. 
The world can't take it away. It cannot dis- 
turb you. That's what He wants to give you. 
And so, today, if you haven't got peace, my 
dear friend, you can have it, and you can have 
perfect peace. 

There's a passage of Scripture that I had 
never known was in the Bible until I accidentally 
heard it. There was a prominent minister who 
died, one of those ministers w^ho had had a large 
salary and had given it all to the poor where he 
lived. He was a man, a public man, struck down 
in the prime of life. As he lay on his dying bed, 

[138] 



TRUST 

he thought of leaving his wife and children un- 
provided for, and there came a cloud over his 
mind. He was greatly depressed; he couldn't 
get above it. While he lay there, thinking of 
the sad lot of his loved ones, a little bird came 
and lit near his window-sill, and with that a 
warmness came into his heart, and the thought 
came into his mouth, "If God can take care of 
that bird, He can take care of my wife and chil- 
dren." At once the trust of a child came into 
his heart and the burden rolled away. After 
that came light, and peace, and joy; all the 
burden and sorrow gone; and he could trust 
the wife and seven children to the God of that 
Book. The text comes to me, Jeremiah 49: 11, 
"Leave thy fatherless children, I will preserve 
them alive; and let thy widows trust in Me." 
They said that, as they bore him away, as of 
old Stephen was borne, the w^hole city was 
moved; the rich and the poor were there, and 
for miles up to the cemetery the streets were 
lined with people weeping. This poor man was 
hardly laid away in his grave before a friend 
rose and proposed that £5000 Sterling ($25,000), 
be raised for that widow and her children, and 
it was done. God took care of that widow and 
her orphans. My dear friends, I tell you today 
that I would rather have faith, and put my trust 
in God, the God of that Book, than have the 

[139] 



TRUST 

wealth of the whole earth. It is better than 
wealth, better than gold and silver. Trust in 
the God of that Book. I wish this whole audi- 
ence could be brought to that rock, and have 
both feet planted firmly on it. 

I remember that, during the war, I was visit- 
ing my Sabbath School Classes, and I got into 
a home where the news had just come that the 
father had been cut down in battle. The 
woman was the first soldier's widow I had met. 
She had two little children, both girls, one about 
three, not quite three, and the other five. A 
few days after this the landlord came around for 
his rent. She told her pitiful story and said 
she didn't know that she would be able to pay 
it every month, because she didn't own a sewing 
machine, and she must get her living with her 
needle; nor did she know she would have work 
during the winter. The landlord was unmoved 
and told her that if the rent was not paid the 
first of each month, he would turn her out. The 
poor woman began to weep. The little ones 
tried to comfort their mother. God bless the 
little ones! How they light up our lives and 
cheer us in our loneliness! To the mother, 
feeling the loss of her husband and the dread of 
the coming winter, faith seemed gone. Then the 
oldest girl plucked the mother's sleeve and said, 
"Don't cry! Isn't God able to take care of us? 

[140] 



TRUST 

Isn't God everywhere? Can't God take care 
of us?" "Oh yes, my child!" "Well, what 
makes you cry, Mama? Mayn't I go and ask 
Him? " She got off the cot — I suppose she had 
a cradle bed — and she went into her room, and 
the mother left the door ajar. The child knelt 
down by the cradle, and to the mother she never 
looked so lovely. The little one prayed: "O 
God, you've come and taken away my papa, and 
mama hasn't money to pay the rent. We'll have 
to sit on the doorsteps and take cold and die. 
Won't you lend us a little house to live in? " The 
prayer over, she came to her mother and said: 
" Mama, just don't cry any more ! I'm sure God 
will hear my prayer. He will provide for us." 

I made that incident known among the busi- 
ness men of Chicago. Soon a lot was bought 
and a house put up for that widow; I believe 
that was the first work of the kind done for a 
soldier's widow in Chicago. 

It was not long after that the mother brought 
her children to me. They told me they had 
a penny bank, and they said: "We have 
something for the soldiers. Won't you take 
this money and buy a Bible and take it to the 
army, and find a soldier not a Christian, and give 
him the Bible, and tell him we'll pray for him?" 
Father and husband gone, the widow wanted to 
pray for some one, and the children wanted some 

[141] 



TRUST 

one to pray for, not having a father. I went to 
the Bible Society, and I got a well bound Bible, 
and then I walked into the army room, down in 
front of a regiment, and stood up and told the 
story. I held up the Bible and said: "Now if 
there's a soldier in this house not a Christian 
that wants to come forward and kneel down and 
take this Bible and have the prayers of that 
widow and of those children, fatherless children, 
in Chicago, will he come here?" It is pretty hard 
to get a soldier to move. But they sprang for it 
by scores. I only gave one Bible that night; but 
I believe a good many were brought into the 
Kingdom. The next night there was another 
army meeting, and I told the story, and they 
sprang forward to get another Bible and the 
prayers of this widow and orphans. I believe 
that God used that widow and her children to 
bring a great many into the Kingdom of God. 
And when the Chicago fire came and burned up 
that house, and nearly all the houses in that great 
city, another house was put up by friends. The 
widow, since that day, has never felt the lack of 
rent. That was at the beginning of the War. 

My dear friends, put your trust in God today! 
Isn't it the most reasonable thing that this whole 
audience should do it? Let us bow our heads 
in prayer, that we may have this day perfect 
trust in God, 

[142] 



INSTANTANEOUS SALVATION* 

"Who shall tell thee words, whereby thou and all thy house shall 
be saved." Acts xi. 14. 

" While Peter yet spake, the Holy Ghost fell on all them which heard 
the word" Acts x. 44. 

I ALWAYS like to close up a week's work by 
making the Way of Life as plain as possible. 
Now, while I am speaking, I want to ask 
of you, who are Christians, that you will pray 
to make the work, the Word, clear. It is a 
matter of revelation, not of investigation. Paul 
says, "It pleased God to reveal his Son in me. 55 
And that's what we want, a revelation of 
Christ, and that will come in answer to prayer. 
By and by, we shall have an opportunity to go 
out, and then we will have a prayer meeting 
like the one we had yesterday. All are invited 
to stay — stay to pray if you are a Christian, 
and if you are not a Christian, stay to see if 
we can help you. 

There's a thought of sadness about the closing 
up of this blessed Mission when so many, I 
am sure, are "near the Kingdom." We want 
if possible to get these people in before the 
Mission closes, and so I hope there'll be much 

* Preached in Tremont Temple, Boston, February 19, 1897. 

[143] 



SALVATION 

prayer, and many ready to use all their influence 
to bring others into the Kingdom. Now, a 
great deal will depend upon the course you take 
in these last days. If you are selfish and come 
to hear, and then put on your hat and slip off 
home, and take no further interest in those 
about you, there'll be a good many who'll not 
be saved; but if you're in the spirit of prayer, 
all through the meetings, and ready for service, 
ready to help some one, we'll have a blessed 
time I'm sure. But, bear in mind that when 
God has anything good to give, He takes man 
into fellowship with Him, and God and man 
must be united. 

I want to call your attention to a verse you 
will find in the 11th Chapter of the Acts, — 
fourteenth verse: "Who shall tell thee words, 
whereby thou and all thy house shall be saved." 

These are the words of Peter in the City of 
Jerusalem. He had been down to Cesarea and 
told Cornelius and his household words whereby 
they might be saved, and the whole family had 
entered into the Kingdom of God. But Gentiles 
and Jews brought up various points. Now 
that gives me authority, it seems to me, to call 
attention to the Word of God; and I believe 
that when any man or any woman wants to get 
into the Kingdom of God, the best thing you 
can do is to take him or her right to the Living 

[144] 



SALVATION 

God, and not to experience, because God never 
repeats Himself, and no two men will ever have 
the same "experience." And instead of look- 
ing for some one else's experience, look away 
to Christ, and let Christ work in you — do 
His work in you. 

This will be the grandest meeting ever held 
in Boston if every man and woman is willing 
to give himself or herself up fully. And I don't 
know that I could tell you the Way of Life bet- 
ter than to give some Bible illustrations. An 
illustration is a sort of window to let light in. 
I will call your attention to some Bible illustra- 
tions that make the Way very, very plain. 

You remember that Noah was called into 
the ark, and all he had to do was to walk in. 
People are trying to save themselves. They 
never can. No one has ever done it. Give up 
trying and, making Christ your ARK, step in! 

I was preaching in Manchester, England, 
some years ago. One Sabbath afternoon I was 
short of workers, and there were a good many 
inquiring the Way of Life. I took some into 
the First Gallery, and after I had spoken five 
or ten minutes, a gentleman came up, a business 
man, and stood on the outskirts of the company. 
I thought he was sceptical. I noticed that I 
had misjudged and that he was interested. I 
said, "My friend, are you not a Christian?" 

[145] 



SALVATION 

"No. I wish I was/ 5 he replied. "Then," I 
said, "I'll speak to you and try to make the 
Way plain to you, and if you can see it, perhaps 
the others may see it." I addressed my remarks 
to him. After I had used one or two illustra- 
tions, I said, "Now, do you see it?" "No. It 
is not clear. It doesn't help my case." I 
gave a number of other passages. "Does that 
make it plain?" "No. That doesn't help my 
case." He was like most people who think 
their case a peculiar one. 

I gave another and another illustration. 
Then he said, "The fact is that I can't feel that 
I'm saved." I said, "Was it Noah's feelings 
that saved him, or the ark?" "Good evening, 
Mr. Moody. It's all settled." And away he 
went. I believe in quick work, but that was 
too quick for me. I wondered if the man did 
really see it. The next day I was looking 
for my "ark man." He wasn't around. One 
afternoon I was going down the back stairs of 
the Free Trade Hall of Manchester, and there 
wasn't much light. A man tapped me on the 
shoulder, and asked, "Do you remember me?" 
"I remember that voice, but I can't locate it," 
I said. " Do you remember the man in the ark? " 
I answered, "I've been looking for you." He 
said, "That settled it all at once. I've been 
trying to save myself by my feelings, and trying 

[146] 



SALVATION 

to make an ark of my feelings, but the moment 
you spoke of the ark, that settled it." He con- 
tinued: "Moody, always tell of the ark." He 
turned out to be one of the cleanest and best 
men in that city. That business man gave me 
a warm grip when I left, and said, "Always tell 
about the ark." Don't you think that's clear? 

It wasn't Noah's tears, or groans, or prayers, 
or works that saved him. It was the ARK. 
And it's the Ark that's going to save you. You 
can't save yourself. Some one has said that 
"the little fly in Noah's ark was just as safe as 
the elephant." It wasn't the strength of the 
elephant that saved the fly. People say, "I 
wish I w T as as good as that man or that woman." 
My dear friend, get into the Ark! The door 
stands open. Come in out of the coming Judg- 
ment; come along in; and now, while I'm speak- 
ing, step in! Will you do it? There's only one 
thing that can keep you out. Do you know what 
that is? It is not your sins. This Ark takes 
sinners. What would become of any one of us 
if it didn't take in sinners ? " This man receiveth 
sinners." 

Now, I'll tell you what keeps you out — it is 
your Will. "Ye will not come unto Me that 
ye may have life." Come along in. The door 
stands open, and God invites you in! Here is 
a promise: "Whosoever cometh unto me, I 

[147] 



SALVATION 

will in no wise cast out." Will God say, "You 
are not one of the Elect. I only meant to save 
a select few" ? I don't believe a word of it. 
The Lord wants every one of you now, wants 
you this minute. 

I'll give you another illustration. You re- 
member when the Children of Israel were down 
there in Goshen, the Lord told Moses to tell the 
Children of Israel to take a lamb of ten days 
and to keep that lamb until the fourteenth day, 
and then kill the lamb and take the blood in a 
basin and with it hyssop. Every man was to 
take the hyssop to sprinkle with, and the edict 
went forth: "When I see the blood, I will pass 
over." Now notice: there was a moment when 
the blood was not on the house and another 
when the blood was upon the door. What was 
it, when death went through the land and laid 
his hand on the people — what was it that 
made the people in Goshen safe? They be- 
lieved in the word of God, the Eternal God, 
and obeyed the word, and it was the "blood" 
that saved them. Thank God, the "blood" 
is on the mercy-seat now. If you'll believe the 
word, there's nothing to hinder. It don't say 
"feel," but "believe." Just believe that the 
blood has been shed. "He was wounded for 
our transgressions; He was bruised for our 
iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was 

[148] 



SALVATION 

upon Him, and with His stripes we are healed. 
All we like sheep have gone astray; we have 
turned every one to his own way; and the Lord 
hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all." 

I don't know any other Gospel or anything 
else to save us. "He bore our sins in His own 
body on the tree." 

Now, if I read the 10th Chapter of the Acts 
aright, that's the character of the preaching 
that brought the whole family of Cornelius, 
servants and all, into the Kingdom of God. 
And there's not a child ten years old that hasn't 
had more spiritual light than had the family of 
Cornelius, and they believed the Word of God 
sent them by Peter. Won't you believe the 
Word of the Living God, and be saved? 

Another illustration: How to be saved all at 
once! "I don't see how a man can come into 
Tremont Temple a sinner and go out a saved 
man!" you may say. I will show you how 
you can. I don't believe there's a man or 
woman that needs go out without salvation. 
I believe you can "pass from death unto life" 
now, and live forever. I believe eternity can 
begin in that seat where you are sitting. 

Let me give you an illustration. You remem- 
ber when the Children of Israel got into the 
Promised Land, God told Moses to tell the 
Children of Israel to build six cities of refuge. 

[149] 



SALVATION 

In those days they had "the law of revenge/' 
Instead of a man's being tried by a judge and 
jury, if one killed my brother, I wouldn't be 
considered a true brother if I didn't kill his 
slayer. Two men are in the forest cutting wood. 
The ax slips from one man's hands and kills 
the other. His only safety is to get into the 
City of Refuge. The nearest kinsman of the 
one killed wouldn't be considered true if he didn't 
have his revenge and kill that man. His only 
safety is to get into a city of refuge. The man 
starts at once. The magistrate's duty is to 
keep the roads all clear; the valleys to be made 
so smooth that a man could run without any 
difficulty right to that city; there'd be sign posts, 
so that he could run without stopping to figure 
out the way to the City of Refuge, or a finger- 
hand pointing in the right direction. 

Now, I am the guilty man, and by the law I 
am exposed to death. I hear that the relative 
is on my track, bearing down upon me. I 
spring into the highway. I don't stop to discuss 
higher criticism, or theology, I don't stop to 
discuss who wrote the Bible. My business is 
to get into that City. I don't think about the 
whale or Jonah now. I don't stop to hear 
rhetoric; I don't care about the elegance of 
flowers by the way. I may be stricken down, 
and I go leaping on the highway. A watchman 

[150] 



SALVATION 

sees me coming, and he is ready to open the gates 
for me. The revenger is corning also. The 
revenger is gaining on me, down the valleys 
and up the hills. At last I get near enough to 
the City so that I can be heard, and I shout, 
and the watchman shouts too, "Escape for thy 
life ! The avenger is coming. Make haste, man ! " 
If I get within that City, I am safe. I am within 
a foot, and if I can gain that foot, I can keep the 
avenger away, and I may have salvation. I 
bound over the threshold. I am saved! 

The Law is after me this minute, and the 
next minute, and every minute. That's very 
clear, isn't it? "The soul that sinneth, it shall 
die." Death is on your track, but God has a 
City of Refuge. You haven't got to get up 
and go out of this hall. Salvation is within 
your reach; you haven't got to lift your hand 
for it. Take it, as you take the air into your 
lungs. Salvation is yours. You are saved for 
time and for eternity, if you will only take the 
Lord God. 

I was in this city in 1854, and some of you, 
older citizens, will remember the excitement 
about Anthony Burns, the escaped slave. I 
remember the intense excitement, and I was 
down here in forty-three Court street when 
Anthony Burns was taken into the Court House. 
In all my life I had never before been in a really 

[151] 



SALVATION 

exciting event. It was all new to me. A city 
in great excitement! Papers teeming with the 
accounts of a man fleeing for refuge to Massa- 
chusetts from Virginia, to take his salvation 
near the Cradle of Liberty! And the city rose 
up and said, "They shan't take that man!" 
Every train was loaded down with people, and 
very many armed to the teeth. I went down to 
Faneuil Hall, and heard some of the greatest 
speakers I had ever listened to up to that time. 
I was never so excited in my life. I felt that 
Anthony Burns shouldn't go back. But the 
LAW took him, and sent him back. The LAW 
was maintained. But, do you know, if Anthony 
Burns had gone a little farther, he would have 
been a free man? No man could have had him. 
Under the Fugitive Slave Act, if a fugitive got 
into a free state, he could be carried back; but 
if he succeeded in reaching Canada, he was a 
slave no longer. England had passed a law 
that no slave, none but free men could breathe 
the air under the "Union Jack." So it was that 
when a slave reached Canada, he was free. I 
see a slave pushing his way to Canada; I see 
his master bearing down upon him. The law 
is going to hold him. Under the law of this 
land he was not a free man but a slave. But 
he has got on the road to Canada, and he says, 
"One night more, then I'm forever free!" One 

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SALVATION 

minute a slave, the next minute he goes over 
the line — and he is a free man. We can cross 
the line and become Heaven's free men if we 
will; every poor drunkard, every libertine, every 
wrong-doer can get out of the devil's country, 
if he wills to be free. My friend, you can do 
it if you will. Make up your mind to do it; 
make up your mind that you're going to have 
done with sin and to serve God all your life. 

I was one day walking down the streets of 
York, England, and met an English soldier. 
I stopped him and asked if I might put a few 
questions. ''Yes, sir," said the soldier. "I 
should like to ask you how long it took you to 
become a soldier?" He laughed, and answered, 
"It didn't take me any time at all." "How did 
you become a soldier?" He replied, "I first 
made up my mind to enlist." "So," I said; 
"I'm trying to get recruits for my Master, and 
I must get them to enlist." The soldier con- 
tinued, "Then I went to the recruiting officer 
and said I wanted to enlist in Queen Victoria's 
army. And the officer brought out a shilling, 
and the moment that shilling touched my hand 
I was a soldier — before I got a uniform or 
knew anything about the drill." One moment 
he was a free man — could go to Australia or 
anywhere else without question; but the next 
moment he could go only where Queen Victoria 

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SALVATION 

told him. Tell me, if you can, will you take 
Christ as that man took the shilling? 

"He that hath the Son hath life, and he that 
hath not the Son hath not life — power, au- 
thority, privilege — to believe on His name." 
What a difference between an unsaved and a 
saved man! One day I rejected the Son of God, 
and the next I received Him. I don't say that 
it doesn't take some will power in rejecting Him 
or in receiving Him; you are a free agent. I 
reject Him; I spurn the grace of God. I might 
have Him; there's nothing to hinder. Thank 
God, there's something better, and that is to 
receive Him, and live forever. Will you do it? 

A man got up in one of our meetings and said 
that he had been forty-two years learning three 
things. I said: "If I can learn three things in 
three minutes, I'll be glad to do it." First. 
He couldn't do anything towards his own salva- 
tion. Second. The Lord didn't require him to 
do anything. I said, "That's so; I tried it; 
I couldn't do anything." Third. Jesus Christ 
had done it all. You haven't got to work out 
salvation; it's all wrought out. When Christ 
cried, "It is finished!" — all we have to do is 
to accept. "The wages of sin is death, but the 
gift of God is eternal life." 

I once read of a woman exercised about her 
soul. She dreamed she was in a dark, deep pit. 

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SALVATION 

She tried to get out. She would climb up and 
fall back, and so on, and so on. At last she 
cried out, "I am lost! It is no use!" She let 
herself down into the pit to die. And that mo- 
ment she looked up towards the mouth of the 
pit and saw a beautiful star, flashing and radi- 
ating in all its beauty and glory, and it seemed 
to lift her up out. She got almost up, and was 
rejoicing that she was getting out of the pit, 
when she looked at herself, and she said, "I'm 
the same old thing!" and she dropped back. 
And then she dreamed the same. The next 
time she fixed her eye on the Star, and rose 
higher, and higher and higher, and got clear 
out of the pit, and her feet struck the rocks 
above, and she shouted, and awoke, and found 
it a dream. But she had learned a lesson. 
She thought that if she ever got out of the pit, 
she must look at the Star of Bethlehem. The 
Lord took her into the Kingdom of God sweetly. 
O man! Look! LOOK! LOOK! "I am 
God, and there is none else." My friends, all 
the people on earth could never save a sinner; 
all the popes, ministers and cardinals never 
saved a church. LOOK! LOOK! LOOK 
now! "Look unto Me, all the ends of the earth, 
and be saved." Now will you do it? You don't 
have to go to Harvard to learn how to look; you 
can look now. Will you look? Will you? 

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EXCUSES* 

"And they all mth one consent began to make excuse, 9 * 
Luke xiv. 18. 

1 DON'T believe a man can be true to his 
country who is not true to his God. I want 
to come now to those three men we read 
about in the Fourteenth Chapter of Luke. 
These three men were invited to a feast. It 
was not an ordinary feast, a common feast, but 
a royal feast. Now, you, who have come from 
all over the world, know that the common 
people do not have an invitation to a royal 
feast. I have been in England a good many 
times, but I never got an invitation to a seat 
in the House of Lords by one in a castle, or to a 
royal feast. Common people don't get invita- 
tions to royal feasts — but I have got one today, 
a real, genuine invitation, and the King wants 
you there, and he wants you ten thousand times 
more than you want to go. 

You will notice that these three men all, with 
one accord, began to make excuses. Now, 
notice that expression: "They began to make 
excuse." They didn't have a good one, so they 

* Tremont Temple, Boston, February 22, 1897. 
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EXCUSES 

manufacture one. Did you ever do that? Own 
up now — you've done that lots of times. 
You've been invited to places where you didn't 
care to go, and you began to shift, and to conjure 
up an excuse. You did it before you were five 
years of age. You heard your mother tell of 
a thing she didn't want to do, and she would 
pile up excuses for not doing it. You know 
the origin of that? It is as old as man. The 
first thing Adam did after he had sinned was 
to excuse himself. We generally give the poor- 
est excuse we can make. Usually we have a 
meaner excuse than Adam had at the beginning. 
He said: "It was the woman." It's a mighty 
mean man that hides behind his wife. "This 
woman," he said. He wasn't to blame. He 
excused himself. You've never seen a man 
who didn't have some excuse for his sin: you 
can't find a man in Boston who isn't ready 
at excuses; he's got them right on the end of his 
tongue. If I should stand here and talk till mid- 
night, tearing excuses to pieces, and asking this 
or that man why he don't become a Christian, 
he would have an excuse made up that the world 
never before heard of. It would roll off his 
tongue like dry peas off a shovel. If he got over- 
taxed, and could not make one, Satan would help 
him. For six thousand years, making excuses has 
been Satan's chief business. He is an expert. 

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EXCUSES 

The first man — what does he say? "I 
have bought a piece of ground, and must needs 
go and see it." I have no doubt he buys it 
without knowing where it is. He bought it in 
some real estate deal, and so he gave that as 
his excuse, "I have bought a piece of ground, 
and must needs go and see it." A very polite 
gentleman. "You take my word back to the 
King, ' Business before pleasure/ A man who 
does not provide for his family is worse than 
an infidel." 

The next man had another very frivolous 
excuse: "I have bought five yoke of oxen, 
and must needs go and try them." Why not 
prove his oxen before he bought them? It was 
a strange time to prove his oxen. A proper 
transaction. He had bought the oxen, — he'd 
all the five yoke of oxen. Probably everybody 
said: "There's not a man in all the country but 
would not rather be at the feast." But he said, 
"I must prove my oxen." 

The third man had an excuse: "I have 
married a wife, and therefore I cannot come." 
Now I want to ask you: Did you ever see a 
young bride that didn't love to go to a feast? 
I never saw, in all my life, one who had good 
health that wouldn't like to go to a feast. But 
the husband and wife are not the only ones who 
want to go; the whole family will be eager, if 

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you have one. The Lord does not want to 
leave the children out. He wants them at the 
feast. This man framed an excuse: "I've got 
married and I can't come." 

Now, look at these three excuses! Don't 
you think they look frivolous, and are very 
flimsy? My friends, I w^ant to tell you they're 
outright lies, every one of them. Those men 
were lying, shamming — the whole thing was 
a sham. In the Prophecy of Isaiah we are told : 
"Hell shall sweep away your refuges of lies." 
The time is coming when all miserable excuses 
will be swept away. Look at those three men, 
living eighteen hundred and more years ago, 
and you will see how men can conjure up excuses ! 
They tell us that we are living in a very great 
epoch, and that the wisdom of the ages is ours, 
and that there never has been such culture and 
wisdom as at the present time. We have had 
one man running up and down the country telling 
us that men's skulls have been growing larger. 
Can't the reporters hunt up for themselves 
better excuses, and put them in the papers 
tomorrow morning? I will challenge any one 
of you to give a better excuse than each of those 
men gave. 

There's no sham about this invitation. Down 
in the evening of this Dispensation there's going 
to be a marriage. Blessed is he that is to come 

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EXCUSES 

to the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. That's 
one appointment I mean to fill. He sent his 
messengers, and they probably were never go- 
ing over the earth as they are today, climbing 
mountains, swimming rivers, crossing deserts, 
going to the islands of the sea and the corners 
of the earth, calling for the world to come. 
"Go and compel them to come in, that my house 
may be filled. " The messengers are going forth. 
What do you hear in return? "I pray you have 
me excused." 

Now, I suppose you would like to "speak out 
in meeting." Please answer back, if there's 
a man or woman in this house that has a better 
excuse than those three men gave — up in the 
balcony or any part of the hall, speak out now! 
I would like to hear from you, in the choir, 
anywhere, any better excuse. Can you hunt 
up a man in the City of Boston who will give a 
better excuse? This is a solemn subject. It is 
a fearful thing for a man to say that he wants to 
be excused from this Feast. Life is very dear 
to me. God has piled up one blessing on top of 
another, and I've never seen the time that I 
wanted to die. I want to live as long as God 
can use me. My work is sweet. And God has 
given me a lovely family. I had rather preach 
than be in a pulpit. But as sweet as life is, I 
would rather have you spring on this platform 

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EXCUSES 

and tear my form to pieces than to let any man 
say, "His excuse was 'I don't feel well.'" 
Better be wise and come along. Can you give 
a better excuse than those men have given here? 
I know you will say: "I don't like to do it in 
this large meeting; but if I had Mr. Moody 
alone, I'd tell him." Yes, I'll come down here, 
by and by, and some of you will tell me some of 
your excuses. 

I have travelled considerable in thirty years, 
and I've tried to follow up my meetings with 
what we call "after meetings," to get down 
amongst the people. I was in Carnegie Hall, 
and trying to find out why they didn't come to 
Christ, and, after all the excuses I have heard, 
I have never heard anything quite so sad as 
that we heard now, "I don't feel well." 

One of the popular excuses in Boston is "That 
old Bible." They say : " Mr. Moody, the reason 
I don't become a Christian is because there are 
so many things in the Bible that I don't under- 
stand." That's the man! I never could find 
in all my life a doubter who claimed to have 
read it through. Don't go off and say that I 
said: "No sceptic or infidel has ever read it 
through." I don't say that, but I have known 
of none who has ever read it through. I have 
known of one who couldn't quote a verse except 
"Jesus wept." I contend that there is no book 

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EXCUSES 

in the world equal to that great Book. A modern 
book comes out now, and you say, "Have you 
read that book? What is your opinion of it?" 
People are very free about giving their opinions. 
There are things in the Bible I don't understand. 
If I could read that Book as any other book, 
I would have got through it forty years ago. 
There are ideas I've never been able to master, 
and depths I cannot fathom. If men wrote 
that Book, then men could write another, and 
we should have millions of Bibles. 

Now, take lawyers. How they dig and study 
at their text books; and after they have been 
studying ten years, they say they don't know 
much about them. You never see a man digging 
ten years at the Bible, as they dig at law books. 
Here is a Bible that not only teaches of things 
in this life but also of things in the life to come; 
and because they can't understand the Bible 
as they do the alphabet, they say it is full of 
contradictions, and "they don't understand it." 

Supposing that little girl down there was 
mine, and I had never sent her to school until 
last week. She comes home, and I say: "Alice, 
do you understand all about Latin and Greek?" 
"Why, Papa, what are you talking about? 
I've been trying all day, trying to get through 
the list of A B C's." And I say: "You've 
done. You've finished your education. You 

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EXCUSES 

needn't go to school any more!" People would 
think I was a first-class lunatic. I want to say 
to this audience: You'll never stand at the bar 
of God and give this "old Book" as an excuse 
for not becoming a Christian. It has cost God 
too much to give it to the world. It has cost 
the lives of the best men that ever lived. Mil- 
lions of men have died to hand that book down. 
I thank God I live in a Protestant country where 
I can read the Bible; and every man in America 
ought to thank God that he's got this Book, and 
stand by it, and hold on to it, and not give up 
an inch. I believe it is a master stroke of the 
devil to get us to give up a portion. The infidel 
says everything against that Book. When a 
man becomes moral, he has no trouble with the 
Bible, but when he becomes immoral, then he 
begins to talk against the Bible. 

Another man says: "It isn't the Bible; I 
don't need the Bible, nor to go to church. I've 
got to read the Sunday newspaper." Own up 
now! Lots of you can't go to church, but can 
go to your various organizations. Reporters, 
take it down and go for them! I'm talking 
facts now. It's going to be a dark day for this 
world when the Bible is given up, and the Sunday 
newspaper takes its place. Will any man stand 
at the bar of God and give that as an excuse, 
the Bible? Many men say they haven't time; 

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EXCUSES 

newspapers, pleasure, and the world, and busi- 
ness crowd out the Word of God. 

Another man says: "I haven't got time to go 
to church, because I've got to have some recrea- 
tion, and must spend my Sabbaths on the bicycle." 
It is a new excuse. Lots of men are giving up 
the Bible for exercise. They've got to have 
some "bodily exercise." Put the bicycle down 
as an excuse. That would sound rather strange 
at the bar of God, wouldn't it? I'm getting 
near home now. 

Another very popular excuse for why I don't 
propose to be a Christian, is that I don't propose 
to give up all the pleasures of this life. If a 
man becomes a Christian, he's got to put on a 
long face, and walk straight up and down; he 
has no pleasure until he gets to heaven! Why, 
I don't know how many times I have had people 
ask me, "Don't you think it's an awfully hard 
thing to become a Christian?" I wish I could 
say it in tones of thunder, "No! I don't!" 
I tell you what I believe: I believe that old Book 
from beginning to end, and when that Book 
says "The way of the transgressor is hard," I 
believe it. Go down to the accursed brothels, to 
the gambling dens, and to the whiskey shops, 
and see that man bound hand and foot; he's 
a cursed sinner, he's a slave to some of the baseet, 
some of the most unutterable sins that have 

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EXCUSES 

gained mastery of man. Go ask that man if 
he has an easy time. His conscience wakes up, 
and lashes him. Ask the defaulter, taken from 
a beautiful wife and lovely children and put 
into prison cell — ask him if the way of the 
transgressor is easy or hard. Go into court 
and see the man there sentenced to be hung. 
Ask that young man if his sin is such a pleasant 
friend. Sin always degrades, pulls down, and 
don't let any man tell me that the way of the 
transgressor is easy and the way of the righteous 
hard. My God does not reap where He hasn't 
sown. My God is not a hard Master. 

I was preaching in the Tombs some years ago. 
There's an iron bridge that runs from the court 
to the jail. They call it "The Bridge of Sighs." 
That's on one side; on the other, "The way of 
the transgressor is hard." I asked: "Why did 
you put that text on there?" They answered: 
"Most of the young men go off that bridge 
praying, and we call it 'The Bridge of Sighs." 
Is there a man in this house that can deny it? 
Does the drunkard have an easy time, as easy 
a time as I have? Does that man, living an 
impure life, a dual life, an hypocritical life — 
does he have a better, an easier life than has 
the man of God? What say you down there? 
What does the Book say? "The path of the 
just shall shine more and more until the perfect 

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EXCUSES 

day." The path of the unjust grows blacker 
and blacker. Ask the drunkard if he has a 
hard time? I met a man on the street yesterday 
morning; he had just crept out of one of the 
lodging houses, and he looked as if he had come 
from the pit of hell. I said, "The devil works 
you hard now, don't he?" He said, "That's 
so." Of course that's so. I pity the man who 
is the child of the devil, led captive by the 
devil. I thank God the fetters may be broken 
today. I want to say that my God isn't a hard 
Master. I want to drive that lie back to the 
pit of hell. "My yoke is easy and my burden 
is light." 

I would like to get a vote on this question. 
I have served the god of this world and the God 
of Heaven, and I think my testimony ought to 
be worth something. If there's a man here 
that hasn't served the God of Heaven, how can 
he testify? Now, there are a good many here 
who have served both masters. Christians! 
Have you found God a hard Master? If you 
haven't, say "No!" Bring it out! (A great 
response, "No!") That's right. Let it ring. 
I like to serve Him, and if I had ten thousand 
lives He should have them all. I tell you, the 
way of the transgressor is hard. These men 
you heard speak this morning — what did they 
say? And now, since they have turned away 

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EXCUSES 

from their old life, see how their faces begin to 
light up with a new light and their hearts with 
a new joy and peace. I thank God for the 
Gospel of Jesus Christ. I believe the Gospel 
of Jesus Christ is the best thing that ever came 
from Heaven. We shall never hear better songs 
from Heaven than that Christ came to blot 
out our sins and put us among the children of 
God. 

Now, my time is up. I will go on with some 
more excuses tonight. If you can, conjure up 
better ones! If you reporters will write better 
ones, we will read them and discuss them. 

We will close by singing, 

"I heard the voice of Jesus say." 



[167] 



INVITATION AND ALTAR SERVICE* 

" Go out into the highways and hedges and compel them to come in." 
Luke xiv. 23. 

SOME of you may remember my speaking 
on the Parable found in the Fourteenth 
Chapter of Luke, where the three men were 
invited to the feast, the marriage supper, and 
where they all with one accord began to make 
excuse; and I was trying to give some of the 
popular excuses of the present day and was 
trying to show some excuses made right here 
in Tremont Temple. I don't think we have 
to go back eighteen hundred years to find men 
and women who want to be " excused." 

Although salvation is free as the air we breathe, 
yet it cost God the richest jewel He had; and 
although this gift is perfectly free, and all are 
invited without money and without price, it 
cost God something to provide this feast. 

I was trying to show that these men began to 
make excuses. They didn't have good ones, so 
they manufactured them, made them up. I 
took up the Bible, and I closed the meeting 
with the oft heard excuse that to be Christians 

* Tremont Temple, Boston, February 22, 1897. 

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ALTAR SERVICE 

will make them gloomy. I was trying to fight 
the idea that God is a hard Master. There's 
no one thing that Satan has been more successful 
in than in making the family believe that God 
is a hard Master; and yet they will throw their 
lives away in wretchedness and misery. How 
many of mankind are deluded with the false 
idea that God is a hard Master and Satan is an 
easy one. I believe there are tens of thousands 
who would become Christians, within ten miles 
of Tremont Temple within the next twenty- 
four hours, if they believed that God is an easy 
Master and Satan a hard master. But men are 
under the power of the awful delusion that it is 
an easy thing to serve the god of this world and 
hard to serve the God of Heaven. If I see a 
man dying for the want of bread, and I give him 
bread, is that making him gloomy? If I see a 
man dying of thirst, and give him a glass of clear, 
cold water, is that going to make him gloomy? 
The Gospel is bread to the hungry, water to the 
thirsty, and clothes to the famishing. 

For many years I've been trying to get a 
man out of prison. We tried on New Year's 
Day to get the President to grant our request. 
I can't tell you what delight came to me when 
I heard of the joy of that father and husband 
when he went back to the bosom of his family. 
Did it make that man gloomy to get a pardon? 

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ALTAR SERVICE 

That's the Gospel, a pardon for all sins, going 
out from under the service of Satan. If you 
should take the most faithful follower that 
Satan has in all Boston, the man that is serving 
the devil most faithfully, and then take the one 
who is serving Jesus Christ, and has served Him 
for the last fifteen or twenty years, keeping 
nearer to Christ than any one else in the City 
of Boston, and let the two stand here: do you 
think they would have to speak to show who 
and what they were? Let that electric light 
drop down so that it will reflect their bodies 
and their faces. Wouldn't that light reveal the 
story? 

The man who has served Satan most faith- 
fully should speak out: "I want to testify that 
my master is an easy one." You would hear 
a voice ringing out all over this hall: "He's 
a liar!" Of course you wouldn't believe it, if a 
man should say he'd served Satan forty years, 
and he's a good master. There isn't a man 
that would believe it. Not one; isn't that so? 

Let a man come to this platform who has 
been in sweet fellowship with Christ forty years, 
and tell the joy in His service: wouldn't his 
countenance show it? Is there any one here 
to deny that statement? Instead of taking 
two men, I'll take two women; for when a 
woman falls, she falls lower than a man. Why? 

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ALTAR SERVICE 

Because God elevated her above man. When 
God created woman, it was His last, His highest 
workmanship. She falls lower; and you take 
the one who falls lowest in all Boston, and let 
her stand here tonight, and then the purest 
woman in all Boston, and let the two stand here. 
Would you not say that the devil is a hard mas- 
ter, and the Lord of Glory a good Master? 

My dear .friends, don't let Satan bind you 
any longer. I'm not talking fiction tonight 
but God's truth. My Master is a good Master, 
and I want no better one. I have served Him 
forty years, and He has been ten thousand times 
better to me than I've been to Him. But there's 
joy to be able to look up, and say: "Heaven's 
my home." I can look right into your faces 
and tell you that He is the Friend, and Master, 
if you want Him; and He will give you joy for 
your sorrow, light for your darkness; He will 
lift you up right out of your misery, and cause 
you to walk in unclouded sunshine if you will 
but let him. 

My friend, it is a great thing to be right with 
God. Now, I don't think that any man or any 
woman in this audience would stand at the bar 
of God and say, "I didn't serve you because 
you were a hard master." You will not face 
the Almighty with that excuse. It will look 
different, and so give it up! Don't give that 

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excuse ! It is utterly false. The devil is trying 
to make you believe that he. 

Others excuse themselves by saying they are 
"too bad." Oh, how many times I have spoken 
to men about becoming Christians and they 
are "too bad." A man might say, "I'm too 
sick for a doctor." But because he's sick he 
needs a doctor. Another man might say, "I'm 
too hungry to eat," and another say, "I'm too 
thirsty to drink." It is because he is thirsty 
he needs water. 

I remember during our War I used to go down 
to help the doctors, not as a chaplain, but as a 
delegate of the Christian Commission; and our 
instruction was to "go for the worst cases first." 
If a man was slightly wounded, we passed him 
by; but if a man was seriously wounded, we 
helped him first. And so I believe it is in the 
battle of life — the man farthest away from 
God needs him most. And it is our instruction 
to go to those farthest away. He "saves to the 
utmost." Don't let any man or woman in all 
Boston sink into the delusion that you are "too 
bad " ! If you can prove that you are a "sinner," 
I can prove that you have a "Saviour." Christ 
came to seek "sinners." I have "good news" 
for you. Suppose that the prodigal son had 
said: "When I get fixed up, I'll go home." 
It was his poverty and wretchedness that 

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ALTAR SERVICE 

brought him home. So it is; it is our need that 
brings us or that brought us. And the instruc- 
tion was: "Go out into the highways and hedges 
and compel them to come in/ 5 And the men — 
those in the highways and hedges — we are to 
go for. You will find that when Christ was 
upon the earth, he was all the time hunting up 
the "lost." 

A man said: "There wasn't hardly any of the 
'cultured' at Moody's meetings. They were 
all common people." I said: "Thank you for 
the compliment! My Master went after the 
"common people." When a man gets above 
the "common people" and wants to go with 
the bon ton, he isn't much good. What we 
want to remember is that Jesus Christ is the 
friend of the common people like you and me, 
a "friend of sinners." The greater the sin, the 
greater need of a Saviour. You could never 
have a better time to come. He wants sinners 
to come. And so, tonight, if you are willing 
to come, He is still ready to receive. LISTEN ! 
If you come to God, He doesn't want to have 
you "dress up." They are having a feast at 
Lorimer Hall tonight, and they are dressed up. 
On the Back Bay you would be expected to 
"dress up." But it wouldn't do any good to 
come to Him "dressed up." 

During the War, I often went down to the 

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recruiting station to see my friends enlist. 
Once in a while a man would come with a stove 
pipe hat and a fine suit, and the next man would 
come with old clothes. Both had to strip and 
put on the uniform of the United States Army. 
Do you understand it? You can never come 
to Christ in your life with so few sins as tonight. 
Some challenge that statement. If I knock off 
swearing, if I knock off gambling, and I get 
drunk once in a while, will I be in a better state? 
LISTEN! Every sin, unless God has for- 
given it, from the cradle until tonight, stands 
up against you. What do you theologians say? 
Is it right? Suppose you go for six months 
from tonight and not commit another sin, don't 
you add the sin of procrastination? Then you 
will be worse off six months from tonight than 
you are tonight. Isn't that so? Then you 
can never come in your life with so few sins as 
tonight. Is that right? Am I sound? Then, 
why don't you come? (Smiling and laughter.) 
He wants you. Do you think that invitation 
is a sham invitation? Do you think that Jesus 
Christ would have been given us, and have sent 
His messengers out to induce men to come to 
Him, if He didn't mean it? What do you say? 
Do you think He will stand at the bar and say: 
"I said 'all,' but I didn't mean 'all.' You are 
a big sinner, but I didn't think of you"? Man 

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may do that, but my Master wouldn't do it. 
Don't let any men say they're "too bad." It 
is the "bad people" we want. I wish we could 
have this hall filled with fallen women and bad 
men, because we have a remedy. Jesus Christ 
can get His arm, a very long arm, reaching down 
into deep, dark pits, and bring them up. (Voices : 
AMEN.) How do I know? Because I've seen 
Him do it. No courtesan or infidel can beat 
me on that ground. 

A man said, "Don't you have any doubts?" 
I don't have any time to doubt. I see my fail- 
ings every day. I pity those people standing 
on the outside and saying, "I have my doubts." 
Get into the current and you'll have no doubts. 
Go on the street and bring the sinner in here, 
and get him converted, and your faith will rise, 
and you'll declare there's power enough in the 
blood for all. It is the man who doesn't do 
any work that doubts. My friends, you can't 
doubt when you have seen a man, a drunkard, 
get away from his past, his adulterous and vicious 
life, and become an honorable citizen, and an 
upright husband, a pure father, — you must 
believe. I would doubt my existence quicker 
than this old Gospel. Don't you tell me that 
any man is "too bad" in Boston. It is not 
true. Come tonight with all your sins. Bring 
your sins along with you. That's what you 

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want to bring. There is one thing that God 
wants — your sins. Bring your sins with you. 
Don't hide them. Put them in a bundle and 
bring them along, and God will blot them out 
for time and eternity. Don't let anybody say 
he is "too bad" to come. It is "bad" people 
He is after. 

There's a coachman up there in the gallery, 
who says, "Moody hasn't hit my excuse. I 
believe in foreordination, and if God has decreed 
my salvation, I will be saved, and if he hasn't, 
I won't. I've nothing to say about it." I 
would like to talk with that man for a few min- 
utes. If that's true, you know and you believe 
that you have nothing to do with this question. 
Well, you carry out that in temporal things and 
see how you'll get on. When this meeting 
closes, don't move toward home. If God has 
decreed that you'll go to bed, you'll get there 
sometime. God will put you to bed if He has 
decreed it. Tomorrow don't go to business, 
unless you feel like it, for if God has decreed it, 
you'll succeed anyway. You don't need any 
doctors if you are sick. 

There's not a man in this audience who has 
any more to do with Election than with the 
government of Japan. Not a bit of it. There's 
not one line in that Book where Election is 
put before an unbeliever. Not one. Suppose I 

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walk down the streets tonight and attempt to 
go into a certain building. A man says, "Do 
you belong to this Library? This is for the 
elect. No one but members is allowed here. 
This is for the elect, you see." "Do you belong 
to this Club? No one but members belong here. 
This is for the elect." I go up to Tremont 
Temple, and I see a sign, " Whosoever will 
come in, not one but all, old and young; all 
invited." I say, "That means me." In I 
come. And when I get in here, I look up and 
see on the wall, "D. L. Moody was elected 
from the foundations of the world to be 
saved." We will talk about Election when you 
go in, and not on the outside. It is a very 
sweet doctrine to the Child of God and very 
precious, but not to an unbeliever. There is 
not a line written to the unbeliever about 
Election. If Paul w r rites a letter to a Church, 
that has nothing to do with an unbeliever. 
But become a believer, and the Letter applies 
to you. Then we will talk to you about it. 

Do you know, I believe that "Come" occurs 
nineteen hundred times in the Bible. It begins 
and goes on through the Book. You will find 
it in Job, and in the Psalms and the Prophets, 
in the Minor Prophets, in the four Gospels, and 
in the Epistles and clear over to Revelation, 
and on to the last line. "And the Spirit and 

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the Bride say, Come. And let him that heareth 
say, Come. And let him that is athirst say, 
Come. And whosoever will, let him take the 
water of life freely." You know, I am not sure 
that I am right in my theory; but I can imagine 
that the Lord had been in glory for some time. 
He saw Paul had written letters about Election, 
and He saw a man, in Tremont Temple, stum- 
bling over the doctrine of Election, and He said 
to John (John was on the Lord's side, and he 
went on writing, writing, as the Master spoke) : 
"Before you seal up the announcements, make 
it a little more definite, and say it so that the 
whole world shall know they are invited, and 
no one left out, say, 'The Spirit and the Bride 
say, Come." The Spirit and the Church. 
"And let him that is thirsty come." But some 
say they are not thirsty. Men have come to 
me with tears rolling down their cheeks, and 
anxious to be saved, but they didn't have feeling 
enough. "Let him take the water of life freely." 
That is, even if he is not anxious he ought to be. 
The Psalmist says: "I will take the cup of 
salvation and call upon the name of the Lord." 
Come, it is freely offered you. Who will take it? 
LISTEN ! Every man and woman in this house 
is a free agent. You can take the cup of salva- 
tion and drink forever, or dash it on the ground 
and die in your sins. I pass the cup of salvation 

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on to you. In this balcony who will say, 
'Til take the cup of salvation"? Man! One 
draught of that cup will satisfy your longing 
thirst as this world never will. From the mo- 
ment Adam turned his back on God, there came 
a thirst in his soul that can never be quenched 
until the man comes back to God. What held 
the prodigal? He got away from his father, 
and the father could not satisfy his thirst; but 
when he came back, how quickly he satisfied his 
hunger and thirst. 

O man ! Come back to God and call upon the 
name of God tonight. Wouldn't it be a good 
night to do it, this twenty-second of February, 
eighteen ninety-seven, right here in Tremont 
Temple? Just take the cup of salvation, and 
live forever. Will you come? That's where 
the Will comes in play. You can will to do it 
now. LISTEN! I think no less than twenty 
people on this floor told me they would try. 
One man said, "I'm going to try real hard." 
Now what I tell these people is that that means 
they will not. I'll explain it. Suppose I make 
a statement to you, and you say you'll try really 
hard to believe it, — to believe what I say. 
Doesn't that imply that I have deceived you so 
often that you are going to try real hard to 
believe me again? Now say, "I will take the 
cup of salvation, and trust Him to save me 

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from this night." Now you can do it. Will 
you do it? 

Is there a man or woman in this house that 
has the courage to say, "I will take the cup"? 
Will you speak out and say, "I will"? (A 
voice: "I will.") Who else? Come! Who 
will take it? Is there any one else that will 
take it? You can. (Another voice: "I will.") 
The prodigal said, "I will arise and go to my 
father," and the news echoed up to Heaven. 
If a man says, "I will," it will be registered in 
heaven. Any one else? I like these responses. 
I like to have answers back. If God gets con- 
sent and control of your will, you'll never get 
back to your old life. Will you not let God 
take possession of you tonight? You will live 
forever, if you will to do so. Any one else who 
has courage to speak out and say, "I will"? 
I would just like to hear that once more. (A 
woman's voice: "I will.") Who else will step 
out and say, "I will"? 

I was preaching in Knoxville, at one time, 
and a gentleman got up in the meeting in the 
large Opera House, filled with men, and said, 
"Mr. Moody, I want to say right here, publicly, 
I will accept Jesus right here tonight." I had 
not thought of an expression, but "Thank God" 
said I. "Is there any one else here?" Another 
gentleman said, "Yes, I accept Jesus tonight." 

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That was Thursday night. I went from Knox- 
ville down to Chattanooga, and I was preaching 
Sunday night, and when I got through, a gentle- 
man came up to me and said, "Do you remem- 
ber that man speaking out on Thursday night?" 
'Yes." "We all thought he was in perfect 
health, but he died last night." I believe I 
shall meet first and last a great many who have 
settled in my meetings this important question. 
Speak out and say, "I will." Any one else who 
has courage? That's right. There's a person 
who was afraid I should not hear her voice, and 
so she arose. Thank God! I know it takes 
courage to speak out in a meeting like this, but 
I like to hear you. Is there any one who has 
wandered away who will come back tonight? 
(Voices: "I will.") 

Now I am going to pray for all those who have 
spoken. Let us pray for every one who has 
spoken here tonight. Let every head be bowed. 
Let us all pray; and while the heads are bowed, 
and we are praying, all you who would like to 
have us pray for you please rise, all over the 
house. There are seven, eight, nine, ten! Any 
one else? Eleven! Any more here on the 
floor? Thirteen! fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, 
seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty! There 
are two more. Any one else in this balcony? 
There are two. Any one else in this other 

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balcony? Clear around on this balcony? Any 
one else? There's another. Still another here 
on the floor. Let us keep on praying. Truly 
God is with us tonight. Any in the upper 
balcony? If there is, won't you just rise? 
Two, three. Any one else in the upper balcony? 
Four. There are five. There are ten. Any 
one else? Now, let us all bow our heads and 
let us pray; maybe there are others on the floor 
who would like to have us pray for them? If 
you are backslidden and want to come back, 
put yourself in the way of being blest. There 
are five or six more. Any one else here on the 
floor? Any more here in the balcony? One 
more. Is there another? There's another. 
Still another. I'm always looking for some one 
about seventeen. I like to see a young man 
coming. If he lives a life allied to the Master, 
think of the years possible in his life for God! 
I think I have seen one about seventeen since 
I asked. Is there still another? Is the man 
calling for some one else here tonight? If so, 
please rise now. That's right. Thank God. 
Still others. There's another. Any one else? 

Prayer 

Our Heavenly Father, we want to thank 
Thee for the Cup of Salvation tonight. Now 
we pray that all who have spoken may drink 

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freely tonight and live forever. God grant that 
they may never turn back, but now forever put 
their hands to the plow, and may they press 
toward the mark for the high calling of God 
in Christ Jesus. O God, bring these into the 
Kingdom tonight. May every one of them just 
now be born of the incorruptible seed, become 
partakers of the Divine nature. God grant 
that they may not leave this hall until all their 
sins have been blotted out and their names 
written in the Lamb's Book of Life. O Spirit 
of God, take of the things of God and show them 
unto us just now. And may the Spirit do Its 
work. We are perfectly helpless. We can't 
save this people; we can't bring them into the 
Kingdom. O may the Spirit reveal unto them 
the Way, the Truth and the Life, as it is in 
Jesus Christ tonight. 

And now we pray not only for those who have 
spoken and those who have risen, but for those 
who have not had the courage. O Spirit of 
God, wilt Thou not strive with them tonight, 
and may they find no peace until they find it at 
the Cross. Make this the night of their salva- 
tion. Go through this audience now and search 
out the lost, and bring them to the knowledge 
of the truth as it is in Jesus Christ, and Thy 
name, Blessed Saviour, shall have the praise and 
the glory. Amen. 

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"I make known unto you the Gospel." I Corinthians xv. 1. 

1HAVE been preaching day and night for 
thirty years, and I don't think I ever read 
a Scripture in my life when there came 
such a hush upon the audience as here tonight. 
(Scripture read was I Cor., 15th Chapter.) I 
could not but believe that God was speaking, 
and if God speaks I hope you will listen. You 
may turn a deaf ear to me, and perhaps not lose 
anything; but I tell you if God speaks you want 
to hear. I cannot conceive of a greater folly 
than for man to give a deaf ear to God. I be- 
lieve there are a great many praying that God 
may speak to people here in these last hours 
of these meetings. I believe there are a great 
many people praying for this meeting tonight. 
We have asked the people attending the meetings 
regularly not to come this evening, and I suppose 
many of them are praying tonight that God may 
bless the word. While I am speaking, I hope 
every man will forget all about the messenger 
and pray that all may feel the Message. Really 

* Preached at Tremont Temple, Boston, Mass., February 
24, 1897. 

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the messenger is of no account; let us get our 
eyes off man tonight, and think of being here 
with God. If God has a message for any one, 
why, be ready to hear it. 

I call your attention to one word, — one single 
word. I want to get a text so short that you 
will remember it to your dying day, and the 
thought is just one word, — GOSPEL. GOS- 
PEL. It means God's spell; it means that 
God is speaking to man. It is not a time when 
He is imputing to men their trespasses and their 
sins, but a time when He is issuing a proclama- 
tion of forgiveness, of salvation. It is called 
"Good News." I believe it is the best news 
that ever came from heaven to earth. I don't 
believe that there has been better news, or ever 
will come, than the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 

When the angel came down on the plains of 
Bethlehem to speak to those shepherds, he said, 
"Behold, I bring good tidings of great joy which 
shall be to all people. For unto you is born 
this day in the city of David a Saviour." If 
that angel did not know the black human nature, 
if he did not know how vile and sinful man was, 
I have no doubt he thought the whole world 
would shout for joy, — to think that God had 
sent His Son into the world to save it; that God 
had provided a Saviour for a lost world. But, 
you know that, for nineteen hundred years, 

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men of God have gone up and down the earth 
proclaiming "glad tidings" and telling "good 
news," and yet there's only a few who will 
believe it is "good news." I will venture to 
say that more than half this audience doubt 
that statement; you don't believe the Gospel 
is "good news." Sometimes I look into the 
audience to see the faces light up, and they 
look as if I had brought a death warrant. 

If a boy were to bring a despatch, and it bore 
the best news we ever heard, he could only 
deliver the "good news." If he brought the sad 
word of the death of a mother, the death of the 
wife or children, I could tell by his countenance 
that it was bad news. I look over audiences, 
and they look as though I had brought them 
bad news. Well, it would be one of the grandest 
days that Boston ever had if this whole audience 
would believe that the Gospel is "good news." 
And it is "good news." It is "glad tidings." 
The angel did not tell a lie when he said, "Look 
and see; I bring you good tidings of great joy." 
I would to God you would believe, right here and 
now, that it is "good news." 

There was a man in Europe, converted some 
years ago, and after he had been a Christian a 
little while, he got so full of the good tidings that 
he wanted to publish it, and tell everybody 
about it. He read in the papers that the fac- 

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tories had closed and the people were suffering. 
He thought it would be a good time to go and 
preach the "good news." He went down to 
the place, and hired a theater for one Sunday. 
He had the town covered with placards, telling 
that he was going to preach the Gospel free to 
all. He expected to have the theater packed, 
but there wasn't a soul at the building. He 
walked onto the stage, but there wasn't a soul 
to hear him. The keeper came and looked at 
him, and left. He thought it was a huge joke. 
The man didn't want to be disappointed, 
and thought he would go to the shore, to the 
beach, and see if he could not get a hearing 
there. There were a great many walking up 
and down the beach. No one would listen. 
They passed him by with scorn and contempt. 
By and by he saw a man coming up the beach, 
who had on his head a basket of fish, and was 
crying, "Herrings! Two herrings for a penny! 
Good fresh herrings for a penny!" The con- 
verted man asked, "How much will you take 
for all the herrings?" The huckster counted 
and said he would take eight shillings (about 
two dollars). The man said, "If you will cry 
'Herrings for nothing/ and dispose of them, 
I'll pay you your price." The huckster cried, 
"Herrings, fresh herrings for nothing!" but he 
couldn't get rid of one. (Laughter.) He went 

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the whole length of the street, was angry, and 
said, "I didn't know there were so many fools 
in the world." His greatest disappointment 
was that no one would believe him. Some were 
hungry, starving, but they didn't believe that 
those herrings for nothing were good ! And the 
man said, "I will go with you, and there'll be 
two witnesses." He saw a lady looking out of 
a window and said, "Madam, these herrings 
have been recently caught. You can have 
them." Finally, the lady stole out of the house 
and took a couple of the herrings; others were 
watching, and in a few minutes they carried off 
all the fish. 

Now the trouble was that at first they didn't 
believe; and that's the trouble where we are 
preaching. A man doesn't believe that he can 
get something for nothing. 

I was preaching in Ireland, and an Irishman 
said, "You can't make an Irishman believe 
that you can get something for nothing." I 
said, "You can get the best thing you ever got 
in the world for nothing. It is free as the air you 
breathe. Good tidings of great joy, the Gospel 
of Glad Tidings." 

You will notice that Christ, after he was 
baptized by John, went back to his native town, 
to Nazareth, and went into the synagogue on 
the Sabbath, as was his custom. I don't know 

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what night He went there. I don't know what 
called Him back. But His fame had gone on 
before Him. Probably some of the townspeople, 
when He was baptized by John, were there and 
they told of the wonderful things that took 
place when John baptized their own townsman, 
and that He performed certain miracles. His 
fame was spreading over the country, and his 
town was mightily stirred. He went into the 
synagogue, as was his custom, and the minister 
was reading the Prophecy of Isaiah. In this 
synagogue they had women, — the women were 
on one side and the teachers on the other. But 
the women could not see the men nor the men 
the women. Perhaps, among the women was the 
Blessed Virgin and Christ's own sisters. The 
minister handed Him the parchment of the 
Prophecy of Isaiah. He had, perhaps, read in 
that place many times before. He found where 
it is written, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon 
me; because the Lord hath anointed me to 
preach good tidings unto the meek; He hath 
sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, to pro- 
claim liberty to the captives, and the opening of 
the prison to them that are bound; to proclaim 
the acceptable year of the Lord." And he closed 
the book, and sat down. They had never heard 
anything so beautiful in all their lives. 

Never in the history of the world was a town 

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so suddenly lifted up as that one. I can see 
one man touching another and whispering, 
"Isn't this the son of Joseph? Isn't this the 
son of the carpenter? Where has he got all 
this wisdom?" He had not been anointed; but 
He had received the unction from on high to 
preach the gospel. And He said, "This day is 
this Scripture fulfilled in your ears." If they 
had allowed him to finish that sermon it would 
probably have been the grandest they ever 
heard. But instead of believing it was good 
news, they thought it bad news, and they took 
Him to the brow of the hill and would have 
hurled Him into the arms of death, but He 
miraculously took Himself out of their hands, 
and went down to Capernaum. We never hear 
of his coming to Nazareth to live. They didn't 
believe the "good news." That's the way He 
began His ministry. All through the years He 
was preaching that same thing, "to forgive 
sin." After He had gone to the grave and come 
out to the resurrection, the thing He said to His 
disciples was, as His departing Commission, 
"Go into all the world and preach the Gospel 
to every creature." That's His last Commis- 
sion: "Go into all the world." 

Do you know, I believe He wants all the 
world to be saved. I don't know, but I think 
it is one of the men back there in the centuries 

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who heard Peter preaching on the Day of Pente- 
cost, and, as he went on preaching, the man 
came, elbowed his way through the crowd, and 
said, "Peter, is there any hope for me? I am 
the man that drove the nails into His hands and 
feet." "Yes," said Peter; "He told me to 
preach the Gospel to every creature." Another 
man came pushing his way up and said, "Peter, 
I am the man that spit in His face. Do you 
think there's hope for me?" "Yes," answered 
Peter; "He told me as He was about to go back 
to Heaven, He would return, and preach it to 
every creature; and he wouldn't have done it 
unless there was pardon for all who will believe." 
And another man came, elbowing his way, and 
he said, "Peter, is there hope for me? I am 
the man who drove that spear into His side." 
'Yes," replied Peter; "there's nothing in His 
heart but love. He loves you. He died for 
you. He tasted death for you." He preached 
the Gospel to those Jerusalem sinners whose 
hands were dripping with the blood of the Son 
of God, and if these men in Jerusalem could 
be saved, do you tell me that there is a man 
on earth that can't be saved? That darkest, 
deepest act of Hell was the putting of Christ 
to death. That's the crowning act of Hell. If 
God could forgive us that sin, God can forgive 
every man in Boston. 

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Why, a hush would come on this audience 
tonight if I told you that before I left my hotel 
Gabriel came down from the presence of God, 
into my room, and commissioned me to come 
to this audience and say that there is only one 
man of this audience who could be saved to- 
night, and that he had given me his name. 
Ah, then there'd be intense excitement about 
this time. If any are drowsy, you would wake 
up and say, "I hope it is my name!" "I hope 
the message has come that I am to be saved." 
"Wouldn't it be a grand and glorious night if 
I could be saved?" You would want to know 
the name; you have it, it is your name. 

Henry Clay Trumbull told me he was a 
Chaplain and taken prisoner in our Civil War. 
In the prison there were nine hundred commis- 
sioned officers. A little while before he became 
a prisoner he got news at Washington that his 
child was lying at the point of death. He could 
get no tidings from home, and didn't know 
whether the child was dead or alive. One day 
the news came, and it spread through the prison, 
that one man was to be paroled. He thought, 
"That isn't me. There are Brigadier Generals 
here, and Colonels, and Lieutenant Colonels, 
men that outrank me. I only rank as Captain. 
There's many a man in this prison that has 
more influence at Washington than I have." 

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The Confederate officer appeared, "and," said 
Trumbull, "there came silence as if every man 
had been struck by death." One man was to 
be paroled; one man was to be set free. One 
man was to go back to his wife, to his children, 
and only one. "And," he said, "at last that 
officer cried out, 'Henry Clay Trumbull'; and 
my own name never sounded so strange in the 
world before." That sent a thrill through the 
Chaplain's soul. 

My friends, I've got better news than that. 
I have not a commission to say that only one 
man can be saved tonight. Oh, better. I've 
got good news: "Whosoever will, let him take 
of the water of life freely." Salvation for every 
man within the hearing of my voice. Salvation 
tonight for every man in this building. You 
may be saved this very hour, if you will. 

Now, I want to tell you why the Gospel is 
very precious to me. Let everybody wake up 
and listen. If any one is sleeping, wake him 
up that he may hear. I see that a boy about 
seventeen years has gone to sleep. Wake him 
up. I was up in the Mount Vernon Church one 
Sunday, and I went to sleep up in the gallery. 
Some one waked me up. But, do you know, 
that was the beginning of a new life for me. 
I listened for the first time to what the preacher 
had to say, and I thought the whole sermon was 

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right for me; and I turned up my coat collar 
and said, "I'll never go back there in the world/ 5 
Everybody was looking toward me. It will 
be a good thing to wake up at seventeen; he 
may be preaching the gospel after I am gone. 

Now, I am going to tell you why the Gospel 
is so precious. It has taken out of my path 
four of the bitterest enemies I ever had; that's 
why I like the Gospel. I'll tell you, it's the 
only thing in the world that'll take them out. 
The bitterest enemy we have is SIN. The 
Gospel tells me how Sin may be put away. 

Jesus Christ died for my sins. Jesus Christ, 
by his death and sacrifice, has forever provided 
for the putting away of sin and made provision 
for man's salvation. There's not a man here 
tonight who may not have his sin blotted out. 
"Blessed is he whose transgression is hid and 
whose sin is covered." "Who shall lay any- 
thing to the charge of God's elect? It is God 
that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? 
It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen 
again, who is even at the right hand of God, 
who also maketh intercession for us." If a 
man has been forgiven, who can bring a charge 
against him? This Gospel teaches that man's 
sin has been forgiven and put away; and it is 
a great blessing, my friends, to have your sins 
forgiven and put away for time and eternity. 

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THE GOSPEL 

If they are not put away, they'll meet you at 
the bar of God. According to the Scripture, 
"Christ died for our sins. He was wounded 
for our transgressions. He was bruised for our 
iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was 
laid upon Him, and with His stripes we are 
healed." Now if Christ has died for my sins, 
I have not to die for my own sins. If Jesus 
Christ has put away my sins, the enemy has 
gone, and I can look up and claim Heaven as 
my home, because Jesus has cleared the way 
right up to the throne, and made it possible to 
get into the Kingdom of God. 

Another terrible enemy, oh what an enemy! 
is Death. The penalty of sin. Up here in 
these old New England towns, where I grew up, 
it used to be the custom, — it has passed out, 
I believe, — when people died and were borne 
away to the grave, the sexton would toll out 
the age. When I was a boy, I always counted 
the strokes of the bell, and if they went past 
eighty or ninety, I would say, "Death is a long 
way off." But once in a while death would 
come down into the town and take a boy of my 
own age, and then it was serious. Death seemed 
like a terrible enemy. No one ever told me that 
a corpse was cold, and I remember the first time 
I touched a schoolmate, and I drew my hand 
back. Death was cold. 

[195] 



THE GOSPEL 

Then they had the custom of saying, "Ashes 
to ashes/' and it sounded like a "death knell/ 5 
That's all gone, and I can say, "O Death, where 
is thy sting?" and I hear a voice ringing down 
from Calvary, "He tasted death for me." He 
died for me. That's the Gospel. That's what 
gave Paul the wondrous victory and made him 
rejoice. Death had been met by victory. 

I used to think that Death dragged Christ 
right up to the cross and took his life. But, 
no, my friends, He went there to conquer Death. 
When he issued his "It is finished," it was the 
shout of a conqueror. He triumped over the 
last enemy, and that is Death. 

Then, I want to tell you that Christ says, 
"If ye keep my sayings, ye shall never see 
death." Never. That's a wonderful enemy gone, 
gone for time and eternity. 

And then the Grave, — how dark it would 
look. I used to say I never could put my 
friends into the grave. It seemed as if it was 
a mean business. When I was called to put one 
very dear to me, my neighbor, into the grave, 
I could hear the voice of the preacher, "Thy 
brother shall rise again"; but now I can look 
into the grave and shout, "O Grave, where is 
thy victory?" And I hear a voice coming out of 
the grave, "Because I live, ye shall live also." 
Christ went down into the grave to measure 

[196] 



THE GOSPEL 

its depths and conquer it. "He led captivity 
captive," and went up on high and took his seat 
at the right hand of God. The enemy has gone. 
I do not fear Death nor the Grave. 

Then, there's another thing that used to terrify 
me. "After death comes the Judgment." Oh, 
my friends, I used to be terrified; and I pity 
those people who through all their lives are 
under the bondage of death, and all the time 
afraid of the Judgment. 

Listen! Know ye not that ye shall judge 
the world? I expect to be with Christ on his 
throne. A true Child of God is never coming 
into judgment for sin. We are coming into 
judgment for stewardship and reward. One 
may be ruler over five cities and another 
over ten. He entered into judgment for us 
and died for us, and went to the grave for us, 
and is up on high for us. That is the Gospel. 
I don't know any other Gospel, and never have 
been preaching any other Gospel. I believe 
the world wants the old gospel, — the gospel 
that Jesus Christ died in the sinner's place, 
died in his stead. 

Now, my friends, I want to tell you that 
Christ has made everything clear right from earth 
up to heaven, if you will just take Him as your 
Lord, as your Bishop, your Prophet, your 
Priest, your King. Ye need not fear death, the 

[197] 



THE GOSPEL 

grave or sin. He will deliver you from the power 
of sin, if you will let him into your heart, there 
to take up His abode. 

When Governor Pollock was Governor of 
Pennsylvania, there was a man whose death- 
warrant he signed. There'd been a great man 
who had gone to the Governor to see if they 
could not get a pardon for the young criminal. 
The young man had a lingering hope that the 
Governor would pardon him. But the Governor 
said No. The Governor was a Christian man, 
and he thought he would go down to the prison 
where the man was, and* talk with him, and tell 
him that God was merciful and that God might 
save his soul. He went to the sheriff and intro- 
duced himself, and said, "I want you to take 
me to that man's cell, but don't tell him who 
I am till I have left town." He was taken into 
the jail; the iron door opened to the Governor 
and he passed in and sat down on the iron bed- 
stead and told the prisoner that although he had 
been condemned by the law of Pennsylvania, 
there was a merciful God who could save him, 
and he preached Christ, and read a portion of 
Scripture, and explained to him the way of life, 
and he got down and prayed with him. At 
the appointed time the Governor passed out 
and went back to Harrisburg. Some days 
after the sheriff was in the jail, and the con- 

[198] 



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SEP 2 1911 



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